Recruitment for Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Games volunteers was officially launched by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG) on August 28 in Beijing. Both BOCOG president Liu Qi, and International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Jacques Rogge, delivered televised addresses to extend their congratulations, Beijing2008.com reported.

About 70,000 volunteers are needed for the Beijing Games and the number for the Paralympics is 30,000. Volunteers will be selected mainly from university students in Beijing, especially freshmen this year, who will be junior students in 2008.

Municipal education authorities have requested that universities cultivate Olympic spirit, service awareness, and the concept of the People's Olympics by organizing training sessions, conducting volunteering practice, and opening public elective courses on the People's Olympics and Daily Manners.

Officials launch the online application system for Beijing Olympics volunteers on August 28. [Beijing2008.com]

According to the Sydney Olympic Games Official Report, the 46,967 volunteers are divided into those who possess certain skills such as foreign languages or medical knowledge and those who can help organize audiences, traffic and information transmission.

Although volunteers are unpaid, their training activities, as well as their uniforms and foodstuffs, will cost the organizing committee a considerable amount. The Sydney Olympic Games Organizing Committee spent AUS$700 on each volunteer.

What is inevitable is that some volunteers may change their minds and quit for some reason. About four percent of Sydney Olympics volunteers left before the Games closed in 2000.

Among all the volunteers, those who will work in the International Relations Department (IRD) of the BOCOG are especially important.

IRD director Zhang Qing said about 20,000 foreign guests, outside of overseas visitors and spectators, will come to Beijing and will need reception, including delegates of 17 countries that have hosted former Olympics, 119 members of the International Olympic Committee, representatives from Olympic Committees of 203 countries and regions, 10,500 Olympics athletes, 5,500 officials of athlete groups, delegates of 28 international turnvereins, and 500 other working staff, as well as 1,000 VIPs and 200 presidents and ministers of foreign countries.

The IRD will recruit 800 volunteers to subsidize the receptionists group. It will be more like diplomatic activities for volunteers to serve foreign officials, so these volunteers will receive strict training before they start working.

From August 28, 2006 the Beijing Olympic Games Volunteer Work Co-ordination Group started accepting applications for volunteer positions from people in Beijing. Those in other provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities who wish to be volunteers can apply starting in December 2006, and people in Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and foreigners can apply after March 2007.