Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy

Verdant Volunteers is committed to protecting children, young people, vulnerable adults, beneficiaries, Volunteers, Hosts, staff, partners, and communities from abuse, exploitation, neglect, harassment, trafficking, and avoidable harm.

This Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy (Safeguarding Policy) establishes mandatory minimum standards for activity conducted through or in connection with the Platform. The safety, dignity, rights, and best interests of an affected person take priority over publicity, fundraising, program continuity, reputation, convenience, or a user's participation interests.

Verdant has zero tolerance for abuse, exploitation, grooming, trafficking, retaliation, deliberate concealment, or conduct that creates an unjustifiable safeguarding risk.

This Safeguarding Policy applies to all users and activities connected with Verdant, including Volunteers, applicants, Hosts, Host Representatives, supervisors, staff, contractors, partners, donors, Campaign organizers, visitors, and people communicating through Platform services.

It applies to online and in-person contact, Placements, applications, training, events, travel, transport, accommodation, home visits, schools, healthcare, shelters, community programs, fundraising, photography, storytelling, messaging, and off-Platform conduct arising from a Verdant connection.

Compliance is required even where local practice is less protective. Where applicable law or a professional standard imposes a stronger rule, the stronger rule controls.

This Safeguarding Policy supplements the Terms and Conditions, Volunteer Participation Terms, Host and Placement Terms, Privacy Policy, Data Protection Policy, community rules, and Placement-specific safeguarding requirements.

This Safeguarding Policy controls on matters involving safeguarding conduct, child protection, vulnerable persons, reporting, protective action, and related information. Nothing in another agreement authorizes conduct prohibited by this Safeguarding Policy.

Agreement to Platform terms does not replace any consent, clearance, authorization, training, licensing, or report required by law.

Abuse includes physical, sexual, emotional, psychological, discriminatory, institutional, online, or financial abuse; neglect; exploitation; trafficking; grooming; coercive control; harmful practices; and any other maltreatment recognized by applicable law.

Child means a person under 18, unless applicable law provides a higher protective age.

Safeguarding Concern means information, conduct, circumstances, or an allegation that indicates a person may be at risk of abuse, exploitation, neglect, harassment, trafficking, retaliation, or avoidable harm.

Vulnerable Adult means an adult who may be at increased risk of abuse or unable to protect their interests because of disability, age, illness, dependency, displacement, detention, crisis, care needs, power imbalance, or another circumstance recognized by law or professional practice.

Subject of Concern means a person whose conduct is alleged or suspected to present a safeguarding risk. The term does not imply that an allegation has been proven.

All safeguarding decisions should be guided by the following principles:

1. Safety and welfare come first.
2. Every person must be treated with dignity and without unlawful discrimination.
3. Prevention, early reporting, and proportionate protective action are essential.
4. Children and affected persons should be heard in an age-appropriate and safe manner.
5. Information should be shared only with people who need it for protection, legal compliance, or a fair response.
6. Reports must be taken seriously without presuming guilt or requiring a reporter to prove an allegation.
7. Protective action should be proportionate, documented, and reviewed.
8. Retaliation, intimidation, victim-blaming, and deliberate concealment are prohibited.
9. Local law, mandatory reporting, and professional duties must be respected.
10. Cultural practice, custom, consent by a person without legal capacity, or organizational reputation does not excuse abuse.

Each Host is responsible for safeguarding within its Placements, facilities, programs, personnel, partners, transport, accommodation, and beneficiary relationships. This includes compliance with licensing, staff ratios, mandatory reporting, screening, supervision, consent, training, records, and incident-response obligations.

Each Volunteer and user is responsible for following this Safeguarding Policy, maintaining appropriate boundaries, reporting concerns, and avoiding conduct that creates risk.

Verdant may provide reporting channels, verification, moderation, review, preservation, and enforcement tools. Unless Verdant expressly operates a program, Verdant does not replace the Host, emergency services, law enforcement, child-protection authorities, regulators, or professional safeguarding bodies.

No allocation of responsibility prevents Verdant from taking protective action within its control.

A Host must assess safeguarding risks before offering a Placement involving children or Vulnerable Adults. The assessment must consider the activity, population, location, access level, supervision, staffing, transport, accommodation, communications, images, data, physical contact, overnight activity, home visits, complaints, and emergency response.

The Host must design the Placement to minimize unnecessary private or unsupervised access, dependency, isolation, cash handling, intimate care, authority over benefits, and uncontrolled collection of personal information or images.

Safeguarding measures must be proportionate to the risk and reviewed when activities, participants, locations, personnel, or circumstances materially change.

Verdant may reject or restrict a Placement that lacks adequate safeguards or creates a risk inconsistent with Platform standards.

Hosts must define the role, authority, prohibited activities, supervision, eligibility, qualifications, and safeguarding responsibilities before recruiting.

Selection for a safeguarding-sensitive role may require identity verification, references, interviews, qualification checks, police or criminal-record checks, barred-list checks, sex-offender registry checks, professional registration, training, or other lawful measures.

Screening must be lawful, relevant, proportionate, consistently applied, confidential, and repeated where required. A successful check does not prove suitability and does not replace supervision, training, reporting, or professional judgment.

No person may perform regulated, clinical, therapeutic, legal, teaching, childcare, intimate-care, transport, or other sensitive work unless lawfully authorized and appropriately supervised.

The party obtaining a background report or clearance is responsible for required disclosures, standalone authorization, fingerprints or identity procedures, provider certification, privacy notices, correction rights, decision procedures, secure storage, restricted access, and lawful deletion.

Acceptance of Verdant's general terms is not consent to every screening process and is not a substitute for a legally required authorization.

A Host must assess information fairly and in relation to the specific role, applicable exclusions, time elapsed, evidence, rehabilitation, and safeguarding risk. Automatic exclusion is permitted only where required by law or objectively justified under applicable standards.

Background information must not be published, shared for unrelated purposes, or retained indefinitely.

Children may participate only in a lawfully approved youth program with age-appropriate activities, supervision, consent, emergency arrangements, and safeguarding controls.

Where required, the Host must verify the identity and authority of a parent or legal guardian and obtain informed permission covering the activity, material risks, schedule, supervision, transport, accommodation, emergency contact, data use, and photography. A child's views and agreement should also be considered in an age-appropriate manner.

A Child must not create an adult account, misstate age, waive a mandatory right, or be asked to keep participation or communication secret from a parent, guardian, or safeguarding authority.

Consent by a parent or guardian does not authorize abuse, exploitation, unsafe work, unlawful labor, unnecessary institutional access, or conduct inconsistent with the Child's best interests.

Users interacting with a Child or Vulnerable Adult must:

1. Act professionally, respectfully, and within the authorized role.
2. Maintain clear physical, emotional, financial, and digital boundaries.
3. Use age-appropriate, accessible, and non-discriminatory communication.
4. Follow supervision, consent, privacy, safety, and reporting requirements.
5. Avoid favoritism, dependency, humiliating treatment, and misuse of authority.
6. Use only authorized locations, devices, accounts, communication channels, and transport.
7. Report a boundary breach, disclosure, allegation, or concern promptly.

Users must never:

1. Engage in sexual activity, sexual communication, grooming, exploitation, trafficking, or exchange of sexual material involving a Child.
2. Use corporal punishment, degrading treatment, threats, coercion, restraint, or force except lawful proportionate action required to prevent immediate harm.
3. Offer money, gifts, employment, travel, accommodation, immigration help, benefits, or special access to obtain secrecy, dependence, contact, images, or favors.
4. Develop an inappropriate personal, romantic, financial, or exploitative relationship.
5. Invite a Child or Vulnerable Adult to an unauthorized private location or enter their home without authorization and safeguards.
6. Share a bed or private sleeping space contrary to approved arrangements.
7. Use illegal drugs, provide alcohol unlawfully, or participate while impaired.
8. Ignore, conceal, destroy, or falsify safeguarding information.

Where reasonably practicable, contact with Children should occur in observable and interruptible settings with at least two authorized adults present or within an approved team structure.

One-to-one contact may occur only where lawful, necessary for the program, risk-assessed, authorized, appropriately visible or monitored, time-limited, and subject to specific safeguards. A program designed for one-to-one mentoring must use enhanced screening, training, parental or guardian involvement, regular oversight, and documented contact arrangements.

Staffing ratios, qualifications, gender considerations, privacy needs, accessibility, and the nature of the activity must be addressed according to law and professional standards.

No user may create unauthorized unsupervised access or defeat a safeguarding control for convenience.

Communications with a Child must use authorized organizational or Platform channels where available. Personal disappearing-message accounts, secret profiles, sexualized communication, late-night private contact, and requests to hide communications are prohibited.

Where direct digital contact is permitted, a parent, guardian, supervisor, or another authorized adult should be included or able to review communications as required by the program.

Users must not request intimate images, location sharing, passwords, verification codes, financial information, or unnecessary personal data. Suspected grooming, sextortion, trafficking, impersonation, or harmful content must be reported promptly.

Hosts must set rules for devices, online sessions, recording, moderation, data retention, and response to harmful digital conduct.

No person may photograph, record, interview, identify, or publish information about a Child, Vulnerable Adult, beneficiary, patient, survivor, refugee, displaced person, or person receiving services without lawful authority and every required consent.

Consent must address the intended purpose, audience, channels, duration, withdrawal process, and material risks. A person must not be denied essential assistance or ordinary participation merely for declining publicity unless the image or recording is genuinely essential and lawful.

Content must preserve dignity and must not reveal a private address, precise location, school, medical condition, safeguarding status, immigration status, identifying case details, or other information that creates risk.

Exploitative poverty imagery, staged distress, sexualized content, intrusive before-and-after stories, unnecessary institutional access, and content created primarily for volunteer tourism or emotional fundraising are prohibited.

Safeguarding data may include highly sensitive personal, health, criminal, family, location, identity, allegation, and incident information. It must be collected only where lawful and necessary, kept accurate, protected with heightened safeguards, and shared only on a need-to-know or legally required basis.

Users must not upload safeguarding records, beneficiary files, case notes, or identifying information into unauthorized devices, personal cloud accounts, public channels, or AI tools.

Confidentiality does not prevent a report to emergency services, child-protection authorities, law enforcement, regulators, insurers, Verdant, or another person where disclosure is required or reasonably necessary to protect a person.

Records must be preserved where needed for protection, investigation, legal claims, insurance, or mandatory retention and securely deleted when lawful retention is no longer justified.

Transport and accommodation involving Children or Vulnerable Adults require specific risk assessment, authorization, consent, supervision, emergency planning, driver and vehicle checks, insurance, passenger records, sleeping arrangements, and communication controls.

A user must not transport a Child or Vulnerable Adult alone unless the arrangement is lawful, necessary, authorized, and subject to approved safeguards.

Adults and Children must not share a bed. Shared rooms, bathrooms, host homes, camping, overnight supervision, curfews, and changing facilities must follow lawful and age-appropriate arrangements that respect privacy and safety.

Passports, identity documents, phones, money, medication, or mobility aids must not be confiscated or controlled except under a lawful, necessary, documented, and protective arrangement.

Medical, therapeutic, counseling, medication, intimate-care, restraint, or personal-care activity may be performed only by a lawfully qualified and authorized person acting within professional scope and approved procedures.

Necessary physical contact must be appropriate, explained where possible, consented to where required, and consistent with the role. Sexual, punitive, secret, unnecessary, or culturally exploitative contact is prohibited.

Medication, health records, allergies, accessibility requirements, and emergency-treatment information must be handled by authorized persons in accordance with law and documented procedures.

A Volunteer must not independently diagnose, treat, counsel, restrain, or provide intimate care merely because the Host lacks qualified personnel.

If a person discloses abuse or a user observes a Safeguarding Concern:

1. Prioritize immediate safety and contact emergency services where necessary.
2. Listen calmly and take the concern seriously.
3. Do not promise secrecy.
4. Do not blame, confront, interrogate, investigate, or repeatedly question the person.
5. Record the person's own words, relevant facts, date, time, and actions as soon as reasonably possible.
6. Preserve communications, images, records, and other potential evidence without distributing them unnecessarily.
7. Report promptly through the required Host, Verdant, and external channels.

Do not notify a Subject of Concern where doing so could increase risk, enable evidence destruction, trigger retaliation, or interfere with an official investigation.

If a person is in immediate danger or requires urgent medical assistance, contact local emergency services first. Verdant is not an emergency-response service.

Safeguarding Concerns connected with Verdant should also be reported promptly to:

Member support: support@verdantvolunteers.org

Legal: legal@verdantvolunteers.org

Phone: +1 385 233 9891

Provide only information reasonably necessary to identify the risk, affected person, relevant Placement or account, timing, current safety, and available evidence. Do not send unlawful or unnecessary intimate content.

Reporting to Verdant does not replace a legal duty to report to child-protection authorities, law enforcement, regulators, licensing bodies, professional bodies, funders, insurers, or another competent authority.

Hosts, Volunteers, professionals, and other users must understand and comply with mandatory reporting duties that apply to their role and location. Duties vary by jurisdiction and may require immediate or time-limited reporting without organizational approval.

No Host rule, confidentiality agreement, supervisory instruction, reputation concern, donor interest, or internal review may prohibit or delay a report required by law.

Where the law is unclear and a person may be at serious risk, users should seek prompt advice from a competent safeguarding authority or qualified legal professional without delaying emergency protection.

Verdant may make or support an external report where it reasonably believes disclosure is required by law or necessary to protect a person, preserve evidence, prevent serious harm, or cooperate with a competent authority.

Verdant or a Host may take immediate protective measures while a concern is assessed, including restricting contact, changing supervision, suspending participation, removing a listing, preserving records, limiting account access, notifying responsible persons, or referring the matter externally.

Protective action is not a finding of guilt. Decisions should consider the credibility and seriousness of the information, immediate risk, vulnerability, privacy, fairness, evidence preservation, legal duties, and available alternatives.

Verdant is not required to conduct a criminal, child-protection, employment, professional-discipline, or regulatory investigation and must not interfere with competent authorities. Verdant may conduct a proportionate Platform review and apply contractual or safety standards independently of a criminal outcome where lawful.

Where appropriate and lawful, a Subject of Concern may be informed of the general nature of an allegation and given an opportunity to provide information. Details may be limited to protect affected persons, reporters, witnesses, privacy, safeguarding methods, or official investigations.

Affected persons should be treated with dignity and directed to appropriate medical, psychological, legal, social, emergency, or specialist support where available. Verdant does not itself provide those professional services unless expressly stated.

Good-faith reporters, witnesses, affected persons, and people who cooperate with a review must not be threatened, punished, isolated, harassed, denied ordinary services, or otherwise retaliated against.

Knowingly false or malicious reports may violate Platform rules, but an unproven or mistaken good-faith concern is not by itself misconduct.

Safeguarding processes should respect procedural fairness without compromising immediate protection or mandatory reporting.

Safeguarding law, age of consent, mandatory reporting, criminal procedure, privacy, background checks, professional duties, and definitions of vulnerability vary between jurisdictions.

Users and Hosts must comply with the laws of every relevant location, including where the Host operates, where the affected person is located, where conduct occurred, and where data is processed.

Cross-border volunteering must not be used to avoid stronger safeguards that would apply in a user's home jurisdiction, under a professional code, or under a Host's funding or accreditation requirements.

Verdant may apply this Safeguarding Policy even where conduct is not prosecuted locally or where local enforcement is unavailable, provided Platform action is lawful.

Hosts must provide safeguarding induction and role-specific training where required by law or appropriate to the risk. Training should cover conduct, boundaries, recognizing concerns, reporting, digital safety, confidentiality, emergency action, and local mandatory-reporting rules.

Policies, risk assessments, screening, training, supervision, incidents, complaints, and reporting arrangements should be reviewed periodically and after a material incident or program change.

Verdant may provide guidance, request evidence, monitor Platform activity, review reports, and require corrective action. Platform monitoring cannot detect every risk and does not transfer the Host's responsibilities to Verdant.

A breach may result in a warning, training requirement, restricted communication, rejected application, removal from a Placement, listing suspension, account restriction, evidence preservation, termination, loss of points or badges where applicable, or referral to authorities.

Verdant may act without advance notice where reasonably necessary to protect a person, comply with law, preserve evidence, or prevent further harm. The nature and duration of action may reflect risk, seriousness, urgency, recurrence, available evidence, and cooperation.

Failure to report a concern, deliberate concealment, retaliation, evidence destruction, screening evasion, or continued contact contrary to a protective direction is a serious violation.

The disclaimers, liability provisions, indemnities, and dispute provisions in the Terms and Conditions apply to this Safeguarding Policy to the maximum extent permitted by law.

Nothing excludes or limits liability for fraud, willful misconduct, gross negligence, death or personal injury where liability cannot lawfully be limited, breach of a non-excludable safeguarding or statutory duty, or any other liability or remedy that applicable law does not permit the parties to exclude.

This Safeguarding Policy applies globally. Subject to mandatory law, the governing-law and dispute provisions in the Terms and Conditions apply.

Questions about this Safeguarding Policy may be directed to:

Member support: support@verdantvolunteers.org

Legal: legal@verdantvolunteers.org

Phone: +1 385 233 9891

For an emergency or immediate danger, contact local emergency services first.