Jon Baines Tours - Projects

Projects

We want our clients to finish a tour feeling enriched by the experience. It's equally important to us that our tours bring benefit to the areas that we visit, most of which do not enjoy our material wealth, rights and freedom. In most destinations we select a local project and make a donation per head, which is included in the tour price. You can read about some of the projects we support below.


		Uzbekistan - Bukhara Orphanage Although orphanages and children’s homes suffered from limited resources under the Soviet Union, there was regular funding and for poorer parents with children, access to child care. Today orphanages in Uzbekistan fulfil a variety of roles, providing special needs education, daytime and weekly childcare for working parents who have no other carers and as traditional orphanages. Our tours to the orphanage have provided a music system, toys, art supplies and musical instruments for the children.

		Ukraine - Orphanages in Western Ukraine Sister Louisa of the Monastery of St George in Lviv also has an important secular role coordinating humanitarian aid received from the Ukrainian Diaspora in English speaking countries, and overseeing its distribution to orphanages throughout Western and Central Ukraine. While in Zhytomir, we will visit one of the orphanages to which she distributes aid and make a donation on behalf of the group.

		Vietnam - The Christina Noble Children’s Foundation The Christina Noble Children’s Foundation (CNCF) was founded in 1991 and has since established over 60 projects in Saigon and the surrounding provinces, assisting over 200,000 of the country’s poorest and most vulnerable children. CNCF is involved in numerous activities including medical care, education and educational facilities, well drilling, revolving loan programmes, emergency assistance to children and their families, and shelters for street children. On each tour to Vietnam, the tour group visits the project and makes a donation on behalf of the group.

		Namibia - DRC School Project The DRC School Project and Community Centre, which innovatively uses porta-cabins donated by the makers of the film ‘Flight of the Phoenix’ in a resettlement area on the outskirts of Swakopmund, is an effort to assist the needs of a growing community in the Swakopmund Municipal District. It has created a centre for the community in order to provide services such as basic education, health information and a cultural forum. The centre serves the community as a whole while focusing mainly on issues facing mothers and children. Each Namibia tour group visits the school and makes an on-site donation on behalf of the group.

		Jordan - The Holy Land School for the Deaf The Holy Land School for the Deaf in Salt, Jordan aims to prepare its pupils for the rigours of life outside and concentrates on vocational training as well as providing a comprehensive curriculum. Students receive training in vocations such as carpentry, blacksmithing, needlework and auto-repair in addition to a basic household skills program. The school also provides hearing services for those who have no health insurance and cannot cover the costs of private medical treatment. In addition the school has a blind-deaf unit and a sign language unit. Each of our tours visits the school and makes a donation per head on behalf of the tour group on site.

		Uzbekistan - Ballet School Fouété With the fall of the USSR, many Soviet cultural traditions became neglected by the newly created Central Asian republics. One of these traditions was ballet, which in Uzbekistan almost died out completely. Fortunately schools such as the Ballet School Fouété are helping to revive this art form. The school is run in the formal Soviet style and caters to children from all walks of life aged from four to eight years old. The school struggles with funding and also finds it very difficult to come by items such as good ballet shoes, so we make a donation of such items when we visit the school to watch a short performance.

		South India - Vidya Sagar Vidya Sagar is a multi-disciplinary centre where speech and occupational therapy, physiotherapy, and education are taught using a holistic approach to children and young adults suffering from cerebral palsy. The primary aim of Vidya Sagar (formerly known as the Spastic Society of India) is to empower the disabled to become independent, go out into the community and lead a better quality of life as they often suffer from being marginalized both by society and their family. Facilities such as the Employment Education Centre train adults for work in the outside world. Vidya Sagar also concentrates on involving the families and has been successful in training and motivating parents to treat the child as they would treat a normal, able-bodied child with their Home Management Program.

		South India - The Belaku Trust The Belaku Trust works in villages in rural Karnataka, serving poor and marginalised households, with an emphasis on women and children. They promote health and development, achieving this through research, community-based interventions and collaboration with existing service providers. The ultimate aim is that their work will help people to help themselves. Our tours to southern India meet with the Belaku Trust and accompany their workers on their community rounds.

		Ecuador - The Galapagos Conservation Trust The London-based Galapagos Conservation Trust (GCT) actively works to contribute to the successful management of the Galapagos ecosystem and to raise awareness of, and funds for, the conservation needs of Galapagos. The GCT is the primary source of information and comment in the UK on conservation in the Galapagos Islands. It believes that well managed tourism, where the local population of Galapagos benefits, is an important source of income for Ecuador. JBT pays a year's subscription for each participant on a Galapagos tour.

		Cuba - Music Fund for Cuba One of the Music Fund for Cuba’s more ambitious projects is the restoration of the Miramar Community Theatre in Havana: Project Teatro Miramar. This theatre, a Havana landmark, will play a very important role in the local community - providing a much needed cultural centre for all ages, but especially for children and young people. JBT makes a donation per head to the Music Fund on behalf of every tour we take to Cuba, as well as visiting Project Teatro Miramar in Havana. .