Foreign Aid: Peace Corps Everywhere

The young, sweat-soaked U.S. Peace Corpsmen emerged from the African rain forest to find a neat, white clinic in a straw-hut village — and a warm Willkommen from a couple of young German doctors, themselves members of a peace corps. If it has not happened already, such an encounter is bound to occur sooner or later. Struck by the success of the U.S. program, no fewer than 22 nations are beginning to field Peace Corps of their own.

Sharing the Miracle. One of the most ambitious imitators is West Germany. Prodded by their allies, who wanted them to share some of the fruits of the vaunted economic miracle with underdeveloped lands, the Germans last year launched what they called, with a typical talent for uninspiring nomenclature, Deutscher Entwicklungsdienst (German Development Service). Applications poured in by the thousands, and 78 volunteers have already completed the intensive twelve-week training course. They are now training workers at an auto plant in Libya, teaching at trade schools in Afghanistan and working with farmers in India. Last week 23 German volunteers flew into Dar es Salaam, capital of Tanzania, to begin building 5,000 new apartments in a slum-clearance project.

Like U.S. Peace Corpsmen, the Germans work hard for little pay. They sign up for their two-year hitches out of idealism and an itch for adventure, adopting the motto “To learn and to help.” While young teachers and recent college graduates dominate the U.S. program, the Germans are primarily recruiting farmers, construction workers, mechanics, nurses and social workers, especially those who have already had job experience. The German goal: to send out 1,000 volunteers a year.

Volunteering for Progress. They will find many kindred spirits already at work. Norway, which claims that it was the first to copy President Kennedy’s Peace Corps idea, has teams in Uganda. Similar programs have been initiated by Canada, Australia, Denmark, The Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland. The French Volontaires du Progres has dispatched 95 farmers, carpenters, masons and doctors to France’s former African colonies, and within a year expects to have 400 in action.

Though started in 1958 as a small private organization, Britain’s Voluntary Service Overseas went into high gear after the Peace Corps came along, now gets matching funds from the government and counts 700 workers in the field, mostly in Commonwealth countries and European refugee camps. Three developing countries—El Salvador, Kenya and Zambia—have started domestic Peace Corps to work within their own borders. Nine other countries are planning overseas or domestic Peace Corps-style organizations: Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Italy, Japan, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, and even tiny Liechtenstein.

All told, the foreign groups, with an estimated 1,000 volunteers in service, are still far behind the U.S.’s 7,700. The U.S. Peace Corps is delighted, has set up the International Secretariat for Voluntary Service in Washington to encourage even more imitation.