- The program
- The communities
- Volunteer accommodations
- Volunteers’ meals
- Entertainment and sight-seeing
- Program fees
- Volunteers’ safety
- Minimum qualification required
- Rough estimate of total cost involved
- Next steps — after you have been accepted
- Other relevant facts about the program
- Apply for this program
- Sign up for our newsletter
- Submit a question
The program
Help construct a school or a library etc. for rural and semi-rural communities. An ideal project for short term volunteers, no skills are required and you are able to make a significant contribution even you are only staying one week.
Volunteers should bring gloves, flashlight, and light weight scarf for sun protection or hat, insect repellent, working boots and water bottle. Please note, this project has an additional fee of US$40 per week for construction and renovation materials that are used during the project. This project focuses on the construction and renovation of orphanages, clinics, community centers, toilet facilities, libraries and building of classrooms (schools), roads and drainage system and digging of wells. Volunteers also have the opportunity to meet chiefs and community elders, and learn about the various cultures of the different communities through drumming, music and dance. Volunteers work closely with the local people and VIGS Ghana staff on tasks which include painting, brick laying, plastering, digging, block shaping, carpentry, steel bending, mortar mixing, etc. If you’re a keen outdoors person with a good level of fitness, this will be a perfect project for you. The Construction and Renovation project offers volunteers the special opportunity to work alongside local people to help improve the infrastructure in small, rural communities.
Program highlights:
- Experience working independently or as part of a team in a multicultural environment.
- Spend 2-4 weeks or more in rural Ghana and immerse in the local culture.
The communities
This program is currently available only in Senya Beraku, Central Region of Ghana. Back to top
Volunteers’ accommodation
Volunteers live in the dedicated Volunteer House. Each bedroom in the house can contain three separate beds; three volunteers. The resident cook shall provide delicious meals – no matter your personal diet restrictions. Volunteers coming as a pair or couple will not be placed with other volunteers in the same bedroom. We recommend that you bring along a mosquito net and a spare bed sheet. Many homes have a shower and flush toilet. In others you would have to manage with a bucket of water and a pit toilet – more likely in smaller towns and villages. Laundry is usually done with a couple of buckets. Back to top
Volunteers’ meals
Breakfast: 6.30 – 7.00 am
Lunch: 12.30 – 1.00 pm
Dinner: 6.00 – 7.00 pm
Volunteers will be fed a variety of food including indigenous African dishes such as yam, plantain, fufu, banku, jollof and red-red or gobé, as well as ‘foreign’ meals such as rice and pasta. Volunteers with special dietary stipulations such as vegetarianism or lactose intolerance can easily be catered for. Volunteers have to budget for their own drinking water. Bottled (as well as filtered, bagged) water is available for purchase in many parts of the village. A 1.5 liter bottle costs about US$0.85 whilst a pack of bagged filtered water (popularly known as ‘pure water’) costs about US$1.00. One pack of bagged filtered water contains twenty-five 0.5 liter pieces of ‘pure water’ sachets or bags. An alternative to buying bottled or ‘pure water’ would be to treat the tap-water with water purification tablets. Water purification tablets are not readily available in Ghana so you would have to bring some along if you intend to treat your own drinking water. Back to top
Entertainment and sight-seeing
Weekends (Friday afternoon till Sunday evening) are free days. Volunteers at the children’s home usually would organize entertainment and sight-seeing trips as a group to interesting places far and near. Back to top
| Duration | Program fee (US$) |
| One week | 490 |
| Two weeks | 590 |
| Three weeks | 690 |
| Four weeks | 790 |
| Six weeks | 990 |
Volunteers’ safety
Your safety is of paramount importance to VIGS GHANA. As such we give you all the relevant safety tips, plus we place you only in places where good medical services are within easy reach. In addition, we’ll give you a smart phone – so you can call or text or email or Whatsapp the in-country supervisors whenever the need arises. Our in-country support staff are on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Back to top
Minimum qualification required
Applicants for this program must be able to communicate in simple English since English is the official language of communication in Ghana. Back to top
Rough estimate of total cost involved
- Flight to and from Ghana: US$600-1250 (Round-trip)
- Ghana visa: US$80-170
- Vaccinations: US$150-250
- Travel Insurance: US$70-320
- Miscellaneous personal items: US$300-900
- Personal Spending money whilst in Ghana: US$200 upwards
- Program fee: starts from US$490
So, a rough estimate of the total cost for a two-week program duration would be about US$1,870 – 3,560. Check the equivalent in your currency. Back to top
Next steps — after you have been accepted and given your Placement information
After you have been admitted to participate in the program, you would now have to execute the following:
- Book a flight. See our Ghana flight information page. The earlier you book and confirm your flight, the better.
- Go through the suggested checklist of items to do and bring and start getting (or packing) them
- Send us your flight itinerary
- 60-30 days before your departure date, you must start processing for your Ghanaian visa. VIGS-GHANA will provide you with the needed references in Ghana — which are needed to obtain a Ghanaian visa. Back to top
Other relevant facts about the program
- Minimum volunteering/internship duration: 1 week.
- Maximum duration: 6 months.
- Age range accepted: 18 – 75 years.
- We will send you a document on how to fund-raise for your trip – after you’ve confirmed your participation.
- We will meet you at the Airport in Accra (ACC) on your arrival day.
- The average work day is 3-8 hours for this program.
- Saturdays and Sundays are free days.
- You can contact VIGS GHANA local staff on cell phones all the time — 24 hours a day — seven days a week.
- We can give you a Testimonial on successful completion of your volunteer or internship work.
- You can pay the program fee through any of the following methods:
- By PayPal-Xoom, credit/debit card or bank wire.
- Cash installments (or full payment) upon arrival into Ghana.
