Spring Festival is the most important annual holiday for Chinese people. It is the time of year that all families come together to welcome in the Chinese New Year. However, reuniting is not always possible for young Chinese volunteers serving in Africa.

"We had no running water, no hot water and had to use a bucket to pour water onto our heads when washing hair. But we were happy," Wang Xiaozhi, one of the volunteers in Cameroon, told ChinAfrica. Wang is a student at Peking University, and she went to Cameroon in 2010 and worked as a volunteer when she was a sophomore.

Today, there are more and more Chinese youths committing themselves to voluntary causes. Unlike their predecessors, who preferred to volunteer in Western countries, this new generation of young people have set their sights on Africa. Since Chinese volunteers first went to Ethiopia in 2005, there had been at least 364 young volunteers working in Africa, according to data from the end of 2011. 

Compared to Western countries, China sends fewer volunteers overseas. "The number of young overseas volunteers from China is restricted to a minority group," Huang Lizhi, a doctoral candidate from School of International Studies of Peking University, told ChinAfrica. "By April 2012, China only dispatched 519 youths to serve as volunteers in Asia, Africa and South America, while the number from the U.S. Peace Corps and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) was 300,000 and 40,000, respectively," Huang added.

She noted that China was a latecomer in this field, only sending overseas volunteers since 2002, while the Peace Corps and JICA have been around since 1961 and 1974, respectively. 

Africa is an important area for the services of China's young volunteers. Although small in number, their efforts are lauded by host countries. Mauritius' Ambassador to China once noted that China was the only country dispatching volunteers to his country and his nation greatly appreciated Chinese youths' hard work and dedication.

Challenges

China faces many challenges when dispatching volunteers overseas. One is that the offered services may not meet the host countries' most urgent demands. Charles E. Namondwe, Malawi's Ambassador to China, said that volunteers' services were only focused on certain areas, but that they should instead cover fields relating to the rural population, such as agriculture, food security, urbanization and malnutrition.

Capital shortfall is another challenge. "Host countries are generally responsible for covering expenses relating to accommodation, language training and transportation for foreign volunteers. But many cash-strapped African countries cannot afford this," Huang said.

What's more, China now is yet to set up a complete mechanism to dispatch young volunteers abroad. "For example, we have no clear career planning for returned volunteers, which is hampering sustainable development of the cause," Huang added.

In China, the Ministry of Commerce, Chinese Communist Youth League and Chinese Young Volunteers Association are jointly in charge of organizing young volunteers to serve abroad. In addition, China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides necessary support.

"Joint management of this cause will make the best use of limited resources. However, the multiple responsibility system may also result in inefficiencies as their working objectives are all different," said Huang. "The Chinese Communist Youth League aims at cultivating talent and the Ministry of Commerce focuses on consolidating trade ties with host countries, while the Chinese Young Volunteers Association focuses more attention on services it provides."

Huang hopes more young Chinese will have the opportunity to serve as volunteers abroad to see what life is like in other developing countries.

"As the future of a nation, young people should develop a global vision and care for people's livelihood. Being a volunteer is a good way to realize these goals," she said.