(BEIJING, Feb. 17) -- Over 1,600 volunteers will walk onto the street to
provide information and translation services and first aid for the public during
the Lunar New Year.
An initiative of the Beijing Olympic Volunteer Work Coordination Group,
Beijing Municipal Committee of the Communist Youth League of China and Beijing
Volunteers Association, the campaign will serve as an early-stage try-out and
rehearsal of the city volunteer work in anticipation of the 2008 Games.
In a speech on the occasion of the launching ceremony, Qiang Wei, deputy
secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the CPC and head of the Beijing
Olympic Games Volunteer Work Coordination Group, extended sincere gratitude to
the volunteers for spending their precious time in the service of the Olympic
cause.
During the Spring Festival, fifty voluntary service stands will open at major
public places and scenic spots. Nearly 1,000 applicants to the Olympic and
Paralympic Games-time volunteer project, as well as social and foreign
volunteers, will take part in the campaign.
According to the organizers, the Beijing Olympic Volunteer Program includes
six working projects and a theme campaign -- "Smiling Beijing". The projects
are: the "towards the Olympics" Voluntary Service Project, the BOCOG Pre-Games
Volunteer Project, the Games-time Volunteer Project, the City Volunteer Project,
the Social Volunteer Project and the Olympic Volunteer Work Legacy
Transformation Project.
During the Olympic and Paralympic Games, over 400,000 city volunteers will
offer voluntary services in the city, in addition to the 100,000 Games-time
volunteers that work directly for the Games. They will be assigned to 2,000 city
voluntary service sites at major traffic hubs, commercial networks, scenic
spots, hospitals, hotels, and cultural centers. Also, the number of
social volunteers in the communities is expected to exceed one million while
that of the participants in the "Smiling Beijing" campaign will be ten folds as
much.
Also present at the ceremony was BOCOG Executive Vice-President and deputy
head of the Coordination Group Li Binghua.
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