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Set against the stunning backdrop of Cambodia’s historic temples, September’s IVCO 2025 builds on the highly successful 2024 event. Participants will again join the entire Forum network, the most significant global network of organisations that work with volunteers to achieve sustainable development goals. IVCO 2025 finds our community facing new challenges, with shifting funding priorities, policy changes, and a global civil society under threat: the way volunteers and organisations operate is faced with rapid change.

14–18 September 2025 | Siem Reap, Cambodia
IVCO returns this September and Early Bird registration is now open. Co-hosted by Forum and the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia, the conference brings together global leaders, volunteer-involving organisations, policymakers, and civil society actors for a week of dialogue, collaboration and action in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Over 140 delegates from more than 80 different organisations travelled from 40 countries for IVCO 2024 hosted by Northumbria University this year, from 9 to 13 September.
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This latest think piece by Dr Isidora D. Mytilinaiou, Ph.D. explores how psychological contract theory and emotional labour theory are shaping the design of a new 65+ Volunteer Registry for public children’s hospitals in Greece. Drawing on comparative fieldwork in Greece and the UK, it examines how older adult volunteers can navigate unspoken expectations and emotional demands in children’s hospital settings—contexts where compassion is both essential and complex to manage.

Dans de nombreuses communautés africaines, les crises économiques, sociales et environnementales rendent la vie quotidienne de plus en plus précaire. Pourtant, dans ces contextes fragiles, une force silencieuse, souvent sous-estimée, s’active au cœur des dynamiques locales : celle du volontariat porté par les jeunes et les femmes.
Au Cameroun, cette énergie se manifeste de manière éclatante. Loin d’être de simples bénévoles, ces acteurs volontaires s’imposent comme des piliers de la résilience communautaire, en répondant de manière innovante et engagée aux défis locaux. Qu’il s’agisse de santé, d’environnement, de justice sociale ou de participation citoyenne, leurs actions contribuent à la transformation des territoires.

In our latest interview we met with Rithyra Liv, Country Director at France Volontaires in the Kingdom of Cambodia. France Volontaires has been working in Cambodia since 2002 and opened the first Asian Volunteering Centre in Phnom Penh in 2011.

In 1862, Henri Dunant, deeply moved by the suffering he witnessed in 1859 at the Battle of Solferino, asked a transformative question in his book A Memory of Solferino: could communities create relief groups in times of peace, ready to serve the wounded in times of war? His idea, rooted in compassion and neutrality, led to the creation of the Red Cross Red Crescent (RCRC) Movement, now the world’s largest humanitarian network.
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