User:Rraapphh/Service volontaire international (International Voluntary Service)

The SVI (Service volontaire international) is the European branch of the Vietnamese NGO "SJ Vietnam", located in Hanoi. The SVI is a French-language non-profit association located in Belgium, Brussels. In France, the SVI is registered under the French 1901 Act on non-profit associations, and is located in Lille.

The SVI is mostly dedicated to the international volunteering area (through international work camps), but also to social economy and intercultural exchanges between young European people and the rest of the world. Its main goal is to manage and accompany young people who embark on a voluntary project abroad via different partner associations. Every year, the SVI sends around 900 volunteers abroad and welcomes over 100 young foreign people in both Belgium and France. Each volunteer can take part in projects in almost 100 different countries, and in very different areas (animation, building, environment preservation, etc.).

The SVI has over 4500 active members across France and Belgium and 8 full-time employees.

History
The SVI was originally created in May 2009 in Belgium  as a reaction against the rise of voluntourism, which SJ Vietnam (its parent company) was suffering from. Very quickly, the association grows bigger and becomes soon a full volunteering organisation sending and welcoming international volunteers from all over the world. It is legally registered in Tournai, Belgium, as a non-profit association. In January 2013, the SVI gets officially recognized by the youth department of the French Community of Belgium as "Groupement de jeunesse" (Youth Group). The same year in June, the association is registered in France as a French-1901-Act association.

In march 2014, the SVI leaves the UCL campus in Woluwe-Saint-Lambert where it was settled and moves to the city center of Brussels. During summer 2015, it obtains its license as a sending and coordinating association within the framework of the European Voluntary Service. In July 2016, Minister for Youth Isabelle Simonis recognizes the SVI as an official Youth Organization.

In February 2018, the SVI leaves the Marolles neighborhood and settles in the World Trade Center of Brussels, near the Gare du Nord station. It therefore joins the re-energising "Up4North project". The office moves again in January 2019 as a consequence of renovations in the World Trade Center and joins the ambitious, associative and real estate "SEE-U project " (in collaboration with ULB and VUB Universities).

Activities
The SVI's self-given mission is to "prepare, send and welcome young volunteers on international work camps set up by local and non-profit associations". The volunteers take part in social, educational (informal education), cultural, artistic and environmental projects.

The association organizes international work camps and participates in missions within the framework of the French "Civic Service" and the European Voluntary Service (EVS).

The projects supported by the SVI are always non commercial and set up by local groups like centers for youth, cultural centers, environmental associations, local NGOs, educational centers, youth movements, or even schools. Furthermore, the SVI advocates against voluntourism companies which commercialize, in its point of view, solidarity and poverty for lucrative purposes. Via its director Pierre de Hanscutter, the SVI also frequently takes part in conferences and reports that aim to denounce the wrongdoing of voluntourism.