Jolinaiko Eco Tours

Placement organization

Name of organization: Jolinaiko Eco Tours
Town/city: Amrahia (30km outside Accra)
Country: Ghana
Website: http://www.joli-ecotours.com

Student

Name of student: Gerwin Vossers

Specialist area: ITMC
Placement period: 2012-2013

Information about placement organization

Type of organization: Tour operator
Organization’s activities: Organising tours through Burkina Faso, Ghana, Togo and Benin. (Hotel bookings, cars, drivers, contact with potential clients)
Target group of the organization: Culture lovers
Company culture: Equals. Family enterprise. Their kids running around. Informal working environment
Number of employees: 3
Dress code: casual
Did the organization meet the agreements you made beforehand? Culture lovers

Information about your placement

In which department(s) are you working? Office work and in the field
Brief description of your daily activities: A few office jobs, but mainly fieldwork, which depended on my own initiative
Brief description of your company assignment: Produce a management plan together with questionnaire and information leaflet for their eco-lodge and b&b.
Comment briefly on your supervision by the organization: Good supervision. This was, like all other things, informal. When having coffee or a beer we’d discuss the progress made or any other matter

Requirements for students on placement

What kind of personal skills are required for this placement? Initiative, independent, sociable
Additional company requirements for this placement? Internet, Microsoft knowledge
English: Advanced
Spanish:
French:
German:
Italian:
Other languages:

The trip

Mode of transport to reach your destination: Airplane. From there they picked me up. Half an hour’s drive

Accommodation

How did you arrange your accommodation? Company
How did you go to work every day? Walk. 5 minutes. They have a bicycle that can be used by the intern

Visa / work permit / vaccinations

Do you need a visa? Yes
Do you need a work permit? No, better not, great hassle
How did you arrange the necessary documents:

1 yellow fever vaccination and certificate (stamp in yellow booklet)

2 passport valid for the duration of the internship and 3 months after.

3 4x passport size photograph

4 invitation letter from the company. Send Jolinaiko an email, they’ll have the letter ready for you

5 placement agreement

6 bank-statement (print screen) (they didn’t bother to ask me though)

7 make sure to have copies (4) of all the items listed above.

8 bring glue to glue your passport copies to the paper. (when I was there they had glue provided but it would be silly to travel up and down again for glue

9 address in Ghana incl. all two contact persons (send Jolinaiko an email and they will provide you with these

10 copy of your flight itinerary

If you don’t do things as they please or provide the documents asked for they will send you home.

Make sure to be there on time. Queues are long and everything takes a lot of time there.)
How much time did it take to arrange the necessary documents?
Did you need certain vaccinations? Yes. Yellow Fever. I do not know how long in advance. I had my vaccination in December where I left for Ghana in the first week of January. If I remember it right it would take 10 days to go through your system. I got a little sick for 1 day a couple of days after the injection.

Language course

Did you take a language course before you started your placement? No
Would you recommend to have a language course prior to this placement? n/a

The costs in euros

Travelling expenses (e.g. return ticket): € 650,00
Accommodation (monthly): € 150,00
Local transport (monthly): € –
General costs of living (monthly): € –
Costs of visa: € 50,00 (for 60 days)
Costs of work permit: €
What did the company pay for/to you? Only when travelling for business they’d pay

Culture

How did you prepare for the country’s culture?
I did not really prepare
Did the culture of the country influence your performance during the placement in any way? It did. At one stage I got a bit dragged away by the African way of working. Where things don’t get done straight away and later on happen to be forgotten or just done when it was already too late. This sounds a bit drastic but I did get a bit slack at one stage.

Future students on placement

Future students are free to contact me for further information: Yes
My e-mail address: stoop.m@nhtv.nl

Other information

Recommendations on what to do and what not to do: Don’t take random photo graphs of Ghanaians; they don’t seem to like this.
Leisure possibilities in the city/surroundings of where the placement took place: Cycling, walking. There is a sports center in Accra. But with public transport this takes a bit too long to get there and back. Public transport is cheap but not fast and not the safest mode of transport.

Media

Youtube link Youtube placement video link