Big issues this issue in the United States its people its economy and the way it deals with the rest of the world the bottom line only on aljazeera. Hello and welcome again to rewind im Kemal Santa Maria when we launched aljazeera english more than 10 years ago our goal was to bring you the sorts of documentaries of a channel simply one doing here on rewind we revisit some of the best of them and find out how the stories of moved on and today were returning to a film which had a major impact on young lives and changed the way a Global Business was developing. Tourism it is one of the biggest drivers of the Global Economy in 2018 it was worth nearly 9 trillion dollars making up more than 10 percent of the worlds Gross Domestic Product after emerging from more than 2 decades of war in the 1990 s. Cambodia has relied heavily on tourism to rebuild its economy its one of the Top Destinations for young travelers many of whom sign up with global volunteering companies but theres a dark side to this story war breeds all thins and back in 2012 Investigative ReporterGiuliana Rufus went on to tell them to find that well intentioned tourists were unwittingly fueling the exploitation of children at poorly regulated orphanages from the people in policy areas this is cambodias off a business. Numpad the capital of kumble the. Between the 1970 s. And 1990 s. Cambodia was ravaged by civil war. Since its return to peace there has been a boom in tourism with over 2000000 visiting every year. Came to help this war torn country increasing numbers of tourists and now also working as one until. Most come with the very best intentions to work in schools and orphanages and filling a gap left by a lack of development funding. But recently disturbing stories have emerged that come boden children are being exploited by some of the companies organizing volunteers all running all from agencies weve come to somebody out to investigate allegations that try to few of these orphanages out run not for need but for profit. Oh a journey begins on the outskirts of jumpin at an orphanage and School Called the peoples improvement organization. Set up 10 years ago it provides Free Education for 2. When he hooked on the citys main garbage dump. Was that. I. Mean if theres an example of best practice in this industry then perhaps this is it means. The book from denmark has come to teach for 2 months. So has it been so far i really like that its so clean i can do whatever i want and i come in to my files like that everybodys really friendly and the kids i really respect so they really get they give a lot. In a deprived neighborhood p. O. s making a difference to organize pullen tearing in foreign donations. Its found pam and newman explains how past conflicts have contributed to the estimated 10000 children in orphanages on the farm oh yeah they have children and they are so poor and they are abandoned them sometimes they just come to drop in from the door and they leave we dont know who or where they from these people why would a parent leave their child here on the doorstep of your often that. Yeah i do know they. Cannot afford to take camp and also on some family they want but to go to school but they cannot afford. There are now almost 500 or from ages income by a figure that has doubled in the past decade. Some like p i o rely on foreign volunteers for skills and labor but the vast majority use volunteer and to generate income. We find one of them the lighthouse orphanage on the other side of town. Sinking. Yeah lighthouse is home to 108 boys and girls ranging from 3 to 18 years old and. They request that we donate some food for the children to eat you get good food sometimes too you struggle i can say much better than your hometown maybe some on the wrong government or any n. P. O. You so you need to nations from volunteer mr rich he is responsible for bringing volunteers to light house and hes found a way of increasing revenues. If you will from the edges not just hosting get volunteers but groups of School Students on short term stays to just now a group of canadians of visiting in their downtime to students get to play with the children. And over the past week some special friendships have developed even the teachers are not immune to when they say i dont know. Dealing with a kid is going to be hard for just a deaf ear and you know one of these little guys walks up and grabs your hand you have no choice but to sort of follow up with them so. And that its pretty awesome. As canadian simple from scrotes closer not just good will but a lot of money is flowing into the orphanages to. Be supplied by. The labor heavily but the tiles the same and the compost so we sent out about 5000. 00 ahead of time and then i brought a few 100. 00 with me so we bought some rice then we put our call work on a water pump to keep the garden going sell. Kind of give them a little happiness today with their shopping and all this is a huge amount of money in a country where the average wage is 65. 00 a month what they will never know is whether all of it will be used for the benefit of the children. We knew from various reports that in a number. Case is a huge influx of donor money has attracted unscrupulous businesspeople to open orphanages for the wrong reasons. To find out more and geo puts us in touch with conti and young chante who grew up in an orphanage. When the donors discovered that the director had been stealing the money donated for the children the orphanage was closed down. And john t. Take us to see their old home to tell us about the reality of wilsons lives hidden from the eyes of volunteers. And at the moment. But how. Will you know what are you going to be. Over palmer we have have they can i will turn to. You why you. Why didnt you tell the volunteers out was going on but that i am with you. On that will get dinner at me and you guys my mail paddling at least so long and then i came out in the. Palm grove with her. Would come out all men would go away one. Can say is he still suffers spouts of depression he works in 2 different restaurants for just 3. 00 a day. Chante 2 says he still affected he now has a regular job at the airport but not everyone from the orphanages fared so well. John t. Introduces us to china who lives abroad on the streets and stays here was a. Highly her. Town but im going by. What. It is but. A child barely speaks. But the book in japanese. Small kind of fallback you pull what im fat. Up your bad memory and my red hair but hold on to that i think that what by my family and by you. But its not just the combo genes in charge of orphanages who are accused of taking advantage of the money flowing into that 1. 00 tourism has become a Global Industry and with Foreign Companies tapping into the potential profits true. We need us trail now demi jackson is who has volunteered in cambodia for the past 3 years and her experiences have made a jaded about the industry that really let a lot of our nature is there at the things that drive them behind the scenes that you would just see coming in fast time demi explains that volunteers like her book this stays in cambodia for International Commercial volunteering Companies Based outside the country and. Her 1st visit in 2009 was through projects abroad one of the largest in the world. Volunteering comes at a cost and demi surprised how little money actually goes to the local finishes program my doctor once told me that he gets tired all the same way. Here. And you know heartaches of what you pay up to 3000. 00 a month. That he gets tired thats ok so what hes saying is about a 100. 00 a week for legal mention if you have 10 people say that that was a call to be able to say that sent us down here eat a lot of money but there. Is something i just a moment he is. It really. Is an ngo that investigates allegations of exploitation of children in orphanages and its one of the few places where volunteers can voice their concerns. I know from. Ehrenstein mob working on a case about an orphanage called the Childrens Center organization or cuckoo brought to them by former volunteers. So these are the email complaints that we did get from the volunteers really clearly stated what their concerns were. The abuse the children missing the director was openly saying that he did want to adopt the children out for a price about 10000. 00 which is which is extremely concerning for as well the doctrine is illegal in cambodia. There were allegations of physical abuse or food standards so the kids were looking hungry it was open sewage the boys were sleeping under a smaller roof in the roof is leaking so this place is Getting International volunteers going is ations do you know who these organizations are well suited rosa came forward and were volunteering really interested right and this is dating back to literally one pretty much one year ago. She should took the allegations to the competent government to send in their examined in november 2011 and january 2012. Has been inspected tries by the ministry of social affairs and they found the conditions step holding him back very badly but that would close the orphanage down if it doesnt stop complying with the minimum standards. To avoid devising suspicions we go in on the cover that is volunteers wearing hidden cameras. And we are greeted by saying that so often. Just the right of the network yesterday to beg. And go get them. Seen it is king for us to start teaching straightaway oh part you can do that in the market bob well im up one. Good thing i have never done any teaching yeah and ive been told that youre going to have to do the same or. I have the book and you can respond shed still you. Having simply walked off the street we are now teaching an english class then there is a seemingly endless amount of playtime. Many of the children are hyperactive and will demand constant attention it is nice. To see children streets how many of the many times i was thinking. About he said think out of this mess there is no longer. The kids of color nothing to do it was and what she said was totally pointless. When seen it returns he shows us the childrens rooms only half of the beds have mattresses on the side of the so middle of the. Aisle only and i dont know what is the metal these other conditions the government inspectors all scheme to improve that is i would. Never miss out not render income not that right no life. Was there was a lot of heat for that you have run free and they have to do is a lot of people. In the middle of the courtyard we also see the open sewer reporter to see sure. There are accusations that cynic uses the childrens misery to generate donations whether or not this is truth he certainly doesnt seem to make any effort to meet the governments minimum standards. Before we leave sin a tries to get money out of us again i have it was all kinds you have it a. Fairy tale man found out it was a man there was something. He called and said i was. Ready half an hour sometimes i go mad on the right. Things a cuckoo up bad. But in the evening we learn that they can get even worse. Has become a target put child sex offenders and one to come investigate such cases for an n. C. O. Called x. For his own home and. Hes deeply concerned that some volunteer placement organizations fail to ask volunteers to undergo criminal record checks this is the very highest spoken movie in children while living in the office. This guy you know his american guys and he came to come boyer through such a broad he would in no penetrate hospital it was shocking this man dr James Dagostino had originally come to come both yes through volunteer in with projects abroad and at the time here also brought 3 on the boys and one of the elderly in the buying records rented and according to the statement from the boy he appears the boy on multiple occasions in another case a british paedophile nick griffon had opened his very own orphanage and abused boys then. Both men were found guilty and comes out in courts and sentenced to jail terms of 4 and 2 years respectively we return to cuckoo to follow up on the single most serious allegation that some of the children have gone missing from the all slaves. To our surprise a dutchman has a. There is. Also the same thing really say that there are no powers from your face other people who are all the children were taken as a has that part. Of their sick so far. They feel that wherever we turn we keep hearing about projects abroad to our amazement he tells us projects abroad never asked him for a criminal background check which he would have had to agree to under dutch law. When we go looking for direct as soon as we find him at the back. But. We want to test how serious he is about protecting his orphans by asking him if we can remove some of the children. Then run. For everyones safety weve asked the social worker to join us we tell sinnett shes a friend and interpreter we wanted her to. This afternoon to see if we can take some of the kids to our belittle trauma in a plump and think of how many king of egypt or maybe you havent. Seen it is actually getting us to choose between the children. And minutes later with full of them. Never once have we been asked for identification. This is actually totally crazy scene it just allowed us to pick up 4 kids from his often actually they now gone out and we could just drive off with them. We knew from seizures investigations that the children are from the north east of the country but the paperwork at the orphanage was fabricated and the birth parents could not be traced directly to you. The sad reality is that even if the government would come to the rescue of these children they could never be reunited with their families. During our time in cambodia we have heard a lot about projects abroad now it was time to find out more. Projects abroad had a turnover of over 24000000. 00 u. S. Dollars in 2010 they made over 3000000. 00 u. S. Dollars profit and paid a dividend of 1000000. 00 to the 2 directors i asked projects abroad why they continue sending them all until its into orphanages that are so clearly failing the children and why theyre putting children at risk by not asking all their volunteers for criminal background checks the company declines an on camera interview but tells us in writing that cool who receives 50. 00 per month for every volunteer they say that even if the allegations against kuku were correct it would be better for the children in the orphanage to have better volunteers on the ground they also claim that since 2010 they do criminal background checks on the over thirtys and that for those younger they require a written reference from a School College unnamed referee. When we put our allegations to sin at the director of cuckoo he denied them all. Most volunteers decide on visiting cambodia with nothing but good intentions and until things improve the country and its people are said to benefit from sharing qualified skills. But most volunteers also arrive by an increasingly commercial system and before leaving home its worth investigating who really stands to profit from their presence. Cambodias often business a film which played a major pass in increasing the understanding of the potential dont. Its all voluntourism well im very pleased to say that were joined here in the studio by the filmmaker whos julia rufus lovely to see you giuliana you were one of the 1st people to report on this internationally how did you even come across a story like this im actually quite interested in psychology and i was attending a conference on trauma and it was a global conference and there was a psychologist sociologist from cambodia and shed been working on that issue because a lot of the children were damaged psychologically and she told me about it and i thought it was astounding that this really wasnt an issue that was known about at all tell us about the children who you met there 1st of all we used the would they all technically what we would believe to be orphans yeah i mean that was really the 1st thing that i was interested in the vast majority of the children in these socalled orphanages actually do have parents and they there are people who go around and who effectively recruit these children they say to the parents that the children are going to get great education that theyll be in touch with lots of westerners and the parens allow them allow these recruiters to take the children and then they get put into these again orphanages and effectively some of these orphanages are a money making machine and do the children actually get to see the benefits of any of that money or a lot of the children are really damaged theyre damaged firstly because theyre being taken away from their parents and then secondly a lot of them and you can actually see that in our film they have what is called an attachment disorder so that they continuously get attached to a new person a new volunteer plays with them show us them with affection and then leaves very quickly im trying to imagine what what you went through in that actually i know its about the children but i mean thats a thats a very emotional things a goes for where this story really got me is when we tried to take some. Of the children out for a day out and what we try to demonstrate is really the complete neglect of hair that it was just he was just allowed to do it this is something you could be an area because we actually its a country that has a well known problem with child abuse especially paedophilia that is foreigners Foreign Tourists for socalled tourists again coming in and abusing children so the idea that we could take these children out without any supervision was quite astounding and that is really the thing that hit me i was so focused on will this happen can we take the kids out that when we finally said with these kids in the car it was actually quite emotional because we had this sense of the driving of with them in a car and we could have done absolutely anything to these kids and when you did take the children out of the orphanage you had a social worker with you and yeah you can actually see and the film and the social worker she was there for 2 reasons firstly to protect the children to make sure that theyre safe and comfortable and she helped translate but secondly it was also to actually protect us because we were aware that we were making what could be a very controversial film and we were worried about future allegation accusing us to have done something incorrect with the children she was there also to make sure that we were safe in that sense and whats happened since what as far as tightening up the laws. We can talk about the government but what