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Operations
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In response to Taiwan's reform
of the military service, since 2001,
the government has implemented
an alternative service program that
sends outstanding young people
overseas to help in international
assistance projects. This program
has been running for 15 years and
has gone from sending 36 people
in the first group to 77 in the fifteenth
group, for a total of 1,169 people.
The participants’ specialties have
changed along with the diversification
of the technical cooperation projects;
from agriculture and healthcare
in the beginning, the fields have
expanded to include economics,
business administration, computer
engineering, and tourism. This
program has become one of the
most important human resources
for Taiwan's foreign assistance in
technical cooperation projects.
Diverse Overseas Experience
andTraining, CreatingTaiwan’s
OverseasTalent Pool
Before draftees are sent overseas
to carry out their duties, they first
receive a 16-day basic military
training in Taiwan and professional
training for six weeks. The curriculum
covers overseas life management,
with courses on topics such as
foreign language, cultural adaptation,
physical fitness, culinary skills,
and individual work planning. The
contents are intensive, thorough and
practical, and fit the actual needs of
the servicemen deployed abroad,
increasing their adaptive capacity to
life overseas.
To e ff ec t i ve l y deve l op t he
professional skills of draftees, the
TaiwanICDF designs their overseas
work according to their specialties
and the needs of the various (projects)
technical missions. Asides from the
normal day-to-day work,
servicemen carry out
experimental research,
gather information on
host country conditions
o r p r o j e c t - r e l a t e d
promotional content so
that they actively and
effectively participate
i n e a c h a s pe c t o f
international assistance
work.
Because this program provides
the servicemen with solid training,
practical overseas experience that
is otherwise hard to come by and a
suitable service plan, it has become
one of the most popular alternative
service choices, attracting over 1,000
applicants every year.
In 2015 (15th group), a total of
77 servicemen were recruited and
sent overseas to partner countries to
perform their duties in a wide range of
specialties. Agricultural, forestry and
fishery specialties include horticulture,
aquacu l t ure , l i ves t ock , p l an t
pathology and entomology; public
health and medicine specialties
include medicine, dentistry, medical
technicians and public health;
foreign language specialties include
Spanish and French; management
specialties include economics,
business administration, information
management, and tourism.
Since its implementation to date,
the alternative service program has
demonstrated great achievements
and has become an inherent part
in the use and makeup of Taiwan
expatriate manpower.
Thanks to the rigorous
training they undergo for
their alternative service,
draftees have seen
significant improvement
in their foreign language
and professional skills,
as well as their ability to
live alone abroad. After
they are discharged
from the military service
and enter the workplace,
they often become outstanding
employees in the area of foreign
affairs in both the public and the
private sectors.
To take the TaiwanICDF as
an example, over 100 former
servicemen are engaged in foreign
assistance work as of the end of 2015
as TaiwanICDF technical specialists,
demonstrating the program’s
concrete and sustainable contribution
to the development of quality human
resources in foreign affairs in Taiwan.
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Proportion of discharged
servicemen engaged in
foreign affairs work
%
Diplomatic Alternative Military
Service Project
Taiwan Youth Overseas Service
(Alternative Military Service)
4
Case Study