Kerala's tourism community is brainstorming on the possibilities of bringing up volunteer tourism or 'voluntourism' a mixture of tourism and volunteering for a cause.

Voluntourism is a growing trend where tourists add volunteering work to their itinerary while visiting a country. It is aligned with the more established concept of sustainable tourism, that is, by lessening the toll that travel and tourism takes on the environment and local cultures.

"There are many who come forth for volunteering activities such as teaching English to government school kids or building toilet facilities or walls for schools," said Rupesh Kumar, state-level coordinator of responsible tourism programme to Times of India.

"Such activities are already happening, though the publicity of the same is minimal following many discussions highlighting the negative aspects of the initiative. Agriculture students from western countries had helped farmers here in harvesting of coffee beans a couple of years ago. It's beneficial for both the tourists and the local community," said Rupesh to TOI.

However, voluntourism is cold-shouldered by many in the state because of the high chances of fraud fundraising by unauthorized tour operations.