Thousands of volunteers recruited in Hangzhou to support meetings

A drive to recruit volunteers ahead of the G20 Summit being held in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province in early September is picking up steam.

Since registration opened in December, more than 100,000 volunteers have signed up to help with the high-level international forum for governments and central bank governors.

Around 26,000 of these volunteers are university professors and their students, who will be whittled down to a short list of 3,000 through a strict selection and training process.

These will be the on-site volunteers, who are required to have a relatively high-level of language ability and work at the summit itself, whereas city volunteers will help out with public security patrols, environment management and culture publicity in Hangzhou.

Wang Lingwei, a graduate student from Zhejiang Gongshang University, said it would be an honor to be selected as an on-site volunteer.

"I have participated in a lot of training activities, which is very helpful for me. For example, I was provided with a detailed introduction to the G20 and its background," said Wang.

"There is also training on protocol knowledge, and how to provide first aid in the event of an emergency."

Wang Yuejun, director of Hangzhou Volunteering Work Guide Center, said there was more than two decades' worth of community service experience in the city, which has more than a million registered volunteers and 13,750 volunteer organizations, with volunteering service stations in 97 percent of communities.

"Hangzhou's volunteers have a high willingness to participate in service work, and they have also accumulated years of experience, which provides a good foundation for the service work during the summit," Wang said.

In addition to the local recruitment drive, an international volunteer team has also been set up in the city featuring more than 20 students and teachers from the United States, Russia, Italy, South Korea, Ukraine, Indonesia and Congo, among other countries.

According to the local authorities, all volunteers will be managed in real-time through an online platform, with their contributions to the summit recorded in the form of points and rankings to add incentives for good service.

More than 5,500 volunteer service activities have already been carried out in Hangzhou in preparation for the summit, with a total of 360,000 volunteer man-hours recorded.

Wang Hongyi contributed to this story.

(China Daily 04/28/2016 page7)