Vida Loca Travel Charity Pledge

We believe that it our duty to help those in difficulty worldwide. We will donate 5% of all our profits to International Medical Corps, which carries out important aid work worldwide. Please visit their website for more information.

We will also give everyone who books a holiday through Vida Loca Travel the option to donate the cash-back that they receive upon booking a trip to International Medical Corps, via our JustGiving page. If you can afford to, we urge you to do so.

We also believe that the provision of aid can help in the fight against global warming, as described in more detail below. We think that this will be more successful in the long-term than carbon offsetting. Therefore, we believe that customers who choose to donate the cash-back available from their holiday to International Medical Corps will help to reduce their personal carbon footprints, as well as providing much needed aid to those in need.

Why is International Aid so important?

International aid can play an important role in helping those in poor countries to escape poverty traps. We believe that people worldwide have the drive and ingenuity to help themselves out of poverty but, due to circumstances out of their control, they must rely on the help of those more fortunate to make the first steps.

Future international security also depends on helping those in need. As has been seen recently in Darfur and Afghanistan, extreme poverty often leads to violence and can allow extremist views to take hold. History is littered with cases where economic despair has led to parties with extreme views taking power; as democracy grows around the world, often without the educational platform in place for voters to make an informed decision, we run the risk that the mistakes of Germany in the run up to World War II will be repeated again and again.

To stop this, we must ensure that democratic regimes are accompanied by infrastructures and education that help those worst off in society, rather than the unconstrained capitalism that leads to extremism.

We believe that International aid is best provided by non-political and non-sectarian organisations; this is reflected by our work with International Medical Corps.

How can international aid help to reduce global warming?

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that there is a more than 90% probability that the release by human activity of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is leading to an increase in the earth’s temperature.

In its 2007 report, the IPCC identifies the world’s accelerating population growth as a vital factor in the emission of global warming causing gases. Although few pressure groups have focused on the issue, if global warming is to be successfully combated, we must urgently address the issue of population growth.

To meet the tough emission targets that will probably need to be met to control global warming, the developed world must certainly act fast to cut its emissions. But there is also the issue of rapid population growth in third world countries, which leads to new energy generation (normally from high carbon emitting sources, such as coal) and polluting industry in these regions.

The key to halting population growth is lowering the fertility rate to replacement level. The fertility rate in many developing countries is understandably high – many families rely on their children to provide for them in old age, so it is advantageous to have a large family. With high child mortality rates, it also makes sense to have a large number of children, with the knowledge that they are not all likely to survive. This is where international aid comes in – if aid can help to eradicate the diseases that kill the young (such as AIDS and malaria), to raise the standard of living and introduce a welfare system so that parents do not need to rely on a young family to provide for them in old age, then the fertility rate will naturally decline. Aid should also help to educate girls and empower women, which would also lead to a voluntary reduction in the fertility rate. We feel that International Medical Corps can also make a significant difference in this area.

Sources:
Jeffrey Sachs – Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet (2007)
IPCC Panel – Fourth Assessment Report on Climate Change (2007)
Amy Chua – World on Fire (2002