Beautify future of Ha Long Bay” - SJ Vietnam

www.sjvietnam.org
+84 (0) 462872829

INFORMATION SHEET

“Beautify future of Ha Long Bay”

Project World Heritage Work camp - WHC
Code “Beautify future of Ha Long Bay” - SJV1044
Date From August 2nd , 2010 to August 13th, 2010
Participation fee 180 Euros
Project location Ha Long Bay – Quang Ninh, Vietnam
Persons to contact: Tel: +84 422 154 993/ 462872829 (Ask Tung, or Trang)
Mobile: +84.949.866.308 (Tung)
Email [email protected]/ [email protected]
Website: www.sjvietnam.org

This document is only about specific info about your Ha Long Bay work camp. You need absolutely to download and
read the document called « general information » on our server at http://infosheet.sjvietnam.org. There you will find
more practical info about Vietnam and work camps that you need to know before to pack your luggage.

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ABOUT YOUR WORKCAMP

Ha Long Bay

Ha Long Bay (Vietnamese: Vịnh Hạ Long) is a UNESCO World Heritage site located in Quảng Ninh
province, Vietnam, 195 Km far from Hanoi.

Ha Long Bay attracts approximately 90% of the tourists who come to Vietnam. It does a beautiful
bay comprising 1,500 square km situate on the Gulf of Tonkin Gulf on the South China Sea. Though
it forms part of the ocean, its waters are calm and unusually emerald. It has nearly 2,000 islands.
It is so magnificent, that after a very short period of consideration, UNESCO acknowledged Ha Long
Bay as a World Heritage site in December 1994. This is the 2nd of the five listed World Heritages of
Vietnam.

The bay consists of a dense cluster of 1,969 limestone monolithic islands, each topped with thick
jungle vegetation, which rise spectacularly from the ocean. Several of the islands are hollow, with
enormous caves. Hang Đầu Gỗ (Wooden stakes Cave) is the largest grotto in the Ha Long area.
There are two big islands, Tuan Chau and Cat Ba that have permanent inhabitants. Both of them
have tourist facilities, including hotels and beaches. There are a number of wonderful beaches on
the smaller islands.

Some of the islands support floating villages of fishermen, who ply the shallow waters for 200
species of fish and 450 different kinds of molluscs. Birds and animals including bantams, antelopes,
monkeys, and iguanas also live on some of the islands. Almost these islands are individual towers
in a classic landscape which height is from 50m to 100m and height/width ratios up to about 6.
Another specific feature of Ha Long Bay is the abundance of lakes inside the limestone islands, for
example, Dau Be Island has six enclosed lakes.

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About Patrimonito

SJ Vietnam work camp in Ha Long Bay have been selected as pioneer of the World Heritage
Volunteers 2008, 2009 and 2010 to make use of the Patrimonito mascot, symbolizing young
heritage guardians, to educate the public about World Heritage protection and conservation. The
project gathers participants between 16 and 30 years-old from different countries around a
common project requiring collective effort and involvement.

The initiative aims to provide opportunities and tools to sensitize youth organisations and groups
to:

- World Heritage,
- Operating in the sphere of non-formal education in general, using voluntary service as a

method in particular.

It is jointly coordinated by the UNESCO World Heritage Centre and the Coordinating Committee for
International Voluntary Service (CCIVS). The project activities have been designed according to the
needs of the host community and puts strong emphasis on contact and dialogue with the local
population. Between 10 to 30 people will take part in these two weeks youth work camp.

Background of the Project

A weakened aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem

The World Heritage site has to face to several ecological threats as decrease of faunal and floral
diversity or damages caused to caves due to rise of both industrial and touristic activities.

Quantity of garbage floating on the sea or remaining on beaches is one of the major issues.
Although it's not the only cause a big part of those rubbish are thrown away by the fishers living on
the islands or on the floating houses.

Because of tourism development, the Ha Long Bay islands ecosystem has to face the following
environmental issues:

- Mangroves and sea grass beds have had to be cleared and jetties and wharves have been
built for tourist boats.

- Fuel and oil have created pollution problems
- Garbage and Human waste find their way into the soil and water surrounding the islands,
- Game fishing, often near coral reefs, is threatening many endangered species of fish.
- The delicate limestone cave ecosystems are diminishing, carbon dioxide has a deleterious

effect on the caves, light increase make the humidity of the caves decrease, etc.

Definitely, Ha Long bay needs a lot of preservation and protection not only from the authorities but
also from local people and tourists. The work camp is first time organized in Vietnam and is part of

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the “World Heritage Volunteers: Patrimonito rolls up the sleeves”.

The project in 2010

As SJ Vietnam has successfully organized Patrimonito work camp in Ha Long Bay for 2 years, Ha
Long Bay management department asked us to work in a closer way with inhabitants. Hence this
new project which will consist in:

- Organizing rubbish collection both on the sea and the beaches
- Working directly with the inhabitants to make them participate in collection
- Increasing inhabitants’ awareness of ecological value in their daily behaviors, especially

burning or burying garbage instead of throwing in the sea.

Volunteers’ role

Volunteers will participate in various activities related to the promotion and preservation of the
World Heritage in Ha Long bay. They will:

- Work to help protecting the environment, collecting garbage along the beach, going to
high-schools to meet students, jogging or biking around the city to promote and popularize
the images of Patrimonito and environment protection, and much more.

- Raise awareness of both locals and tourists on World Heritage preservation
- Promote the image of Patrimonito, representing a youth heritage guardian.
- Take part in workshops and will exchange information about World Heritage sites

protection in their own countries

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As several local

organizations –

especially some travel

agencies – already lead

some projects to

collect garbage in the

Bay and work directly

with fishers, our work

camp would like to

make efficient use of

these experiences and

implement durable

work on this issue by a

great partnership with

these organizations

Objectives of the project

- Make valuable World Heritage site a cleaner and more beautiful place by reducing quantity
of garbage lying in Ha Long Bay.

- Progressively make use of their garbage by the inhabitants change and by that contribute
to sustainable management of the World Heritage site

- Increase citizenship and awareness of both international and local volunteers regarding
issues of conservation of universal World Heritage sites all over the world by organizing
workshops and cultural exchanges

Work description:

Local and international volunteers will work together every day during the week. You will be
divided 2 teams.
Team 1 – Cooking team will prepare breakfast lunch and dinner for volunteers in work camp.
Team 2 – Working team will do all activities in schedule

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Meeting point

1. Meeting time: August 2nd, 2010 At 9:00 am
2. Meeting point: SJ Vietnam office, Suite 306, C6 block 1, My Dinh 1, Tu Liem, Hanoi,

Vietnam
3. Tel: +84 4 62872829

Mr. Tung: +84.949.866.308
4. How to get there:

Check the document “general information” at http://infosheet.sjvietnam.org

Schedule

World Heritage Camp Schedule
Time: August 2nd to August 13th, 2010

DAY MORNING AFTERNOON EVENING

Meeting the environment groups in

1 Orientation meeting Hanoi Leisure activities

2 Workshops in Hanoi Workshops in Hanoi Cultural night

Study themes (World

Tanabata Action,

3 Visit Hanoi Visit Hanoi (Museum of ethnology) Acrylic Sponges)

4 Move to Ha Long Bay Meeting Workshops

Meeting with

Management Board of World Heritage Workshop (World Beach night with locals

5 Ha Long Bay Tanabata Action, Acrylic Sponges) in cultural exchange

Promote Patrimonito image at Ha

Cleaning Bai Chay Long port for tourists (World

6 beach Tanabata Action, Acrylic Sponges) Study themes

7 Visit Ha Long Bay, Promote Patrimonito image at Fisher villages

Cycling for Environment activities at a primary

environment along the school (planting tress) (World

8 beach and Ha Long city Tanabata Action, Acrylic Sponges) Midterm evaluation

Workshop at coal

9 mining factory Preparation for the exhibition Cultural night

Exhibition with youth Meeting with Management Board of

10 union Ha Long Bay Study themes

11 Free times Leisure activities

12 Leave Ha Long Bay + Final evaluation Farewell party

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World Tanabata Action: is a common campaign which was very successful in 2008 and 2009
among voluntary organizations, managed to put together the efforts of over 20,000 people in more
than 40 countries. The famous ‘Tanzaku papers’ is witnessing the wishes and commitment of
national and international volunteers to protect our planet through concrete common actions.

Acrylic Sponges: made by acryl with which you can wash dishes (and bathtub, whatever) without
using washing soaps/ detergents if the dishes don’t have too much oil for many purposes:

1) Good for water and environment!
By reducing the use of detergent, you can decrease pollution of water! This can be effective
especially like in the following case.
This can be also a powerful tool to raise awareness on importance to protect nature and promote
concrete actions among any kinds of people who can easily join it!

2) Good for saving health and time!
There are many things that we believe necessary by the influence of the commercial information,
but actually not or even harmful like shampoo. Scientists say, if you cannot eat it, you should not
put it on your skin.
You may wash dishes twice faster since you can save a time to rinse detergent.

3) Good for the economy & the project!
You can save some money to buy detergents and even raise funds for local women who make
acrylic sponges

Leisure and exchange activities

As you know work camp is not only to help on environment protection but also is chance to meet
new friends, to understand about local people and share your experiences with other people etc.

Your free time, at the lunch break time, evening or weekend you and other volunteers can arrange
many different activities to show about your life, family, country, experiences, etc. with pictures,
games. Some activities should be:

- Meeting for a daily evaluation: To share the emotion, result and also to find solution for the
project. It is called study part.

- Vietnamese night: Local volunteers will arrange one night to introduce about Vietnamese
food or people, music etc to you.

ACCOMMODATION
We will stay in a simple volunteers’ house in Hanoi and a guest house in the centre of Ha Long city.

FOOD

Volunteers in cooking team will cook for everybody in team. Train yourself to cook (and to do the
dishes with acrylic sponges…). It will be great if one day you could cook something from your

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country (something easy and cheap!). If you need special ingredients like spices and sauces, it is
better that you bring them with you. It could be difficult, expensive or even impossible to find
them here. Make photocopies of some receipt from your country if you don’t know what to cook
If you follow a special diet, please inform us and your camp leaders as soon as possible.

Extra info: www.sjvietnam.org
• http://www.unesco.org/ccivs/patrimonito.htm
• Ha Long Bay – 2,000 islands in 1,500 square km, the World Heritage
• Ha Long city page on Quang Ninh province official page
• http://whc.unesco.org/fr/list/672
• http://www.hsc.csu.edu.au/geography/ecosystems/case_studies/2475/Ha
Long_bay.html#human

• http://www.cruisesHa Long.com/categories/Ha Long+Map+Location/2/13
• http://www.unesco.org/ccivs/NewSiteCCSVI/CcivsOther/culturalheritage/patrimonito_guid

elines.pdf

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