'Go west young man,' serving your nation
By Xin Dingding (China Daily)
Updated: 2004-04-14 00:11

Mu Feng graduated from the prestigious Medical School of Peking University last year and was immediately offered a nice job in a big hospital in Shenzhen in South China's Guangdong Province.

The new young physician had it made.

But surprising everyone, he suddenly passed up the chance and instead chose to be a volunteer for one year at a small village hospital in North China's Inner Mongolia.

In China, these two disparate places are almost polar opposites, symbolizing prosperity and poverty.

One year has passed, and Doctor Mu has not only completed his voluntary service in Inner Mongolia, he has applied to stay in the rural hospital for life.

He said he "felt needed" there.

More than 10,000 young people applied to provide one year's service in the country's poorer western region last year, and 6,000 of them finally made their way to become volunteers of a nationwide project sponsored by the All-China Youth Federation.

As another year of service is going to end this summer, 4,030 of them have expressed their desire to stay on for another year, said Zhao Yong, a senior leader with the federation at a news conference yesterday in Beijing.

And there were another third of the volunteers who said they wanted to settle down in the west for their careers, like Mu Feng.

"The next step in our plans is to send 6,000 more young volunteers to the west, so as to bring the total number of volunteers to 10,000 during 2004 and 2005," Zhao said, adding that medical volunteers are especially needed.

The project started last year as a move to support the country's western development strategy and promote the "volunteer spirit in China," officials said.

Zhao said the project has done a great deal of good to local economy and education programmes, and many local families have benefited.

"Though the number of volunteers is trivial compared to the total population of youngsters now, they have already cast a significant influence on others," said Zhao.

A survey done by the federation shows the number of young people who want to apply for the project this year has already increased 17 per cent over last year's total.

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