Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) yesterday honored the diplomatic contributions of the country’s aid technicians, as Taiwan marked the 50th anniversary of the first agricultural aid mission sent overseas.
“These specialists overcame great difficulties to improve the locals’ livelihoods and lay solid foundations for relations between Taiwan and other countries,“ Yang said at a ceremony held in Taipei. “They also helped raise Taiwan’s international profile.”
The country sent its first mission of farming experts, hailed as “grassroots ambassadors” to Vietnam in 1959. Today, however, the scope of these missions has moved beyond the agricultural sector.
“We now have missions made up of experts from the high-tech, medical, solar energy, environmental protection, business marketing and computer engineering fields,” Yang said.
Thirty-three of these original experts — who went on their missions in their 20s and now have gray hair — attended a ceremony organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ International Cooperation and Development Fund yesterday to unveil a book featuring their stories.
At the peak period in the 1970s, Taiwan had 1,000 specialists posted overseas, with 47 overseas missions in the 1990s, according to the book. However, the number had decreased to 33 missions in 28 countries, with just 225 specialists, as of this year. A total of 38 people have died on mission over the years, either because of war, disease or accidents.
Yang Wu-jiun, who was sent to Sierra Leone in the late 1970s at the age of 28, said he joined the mission with seven others because it was difficult for Taiwanese to travel abroad at that time.
“I wanted to take the opportunity to go overseas, even though I had been married for just five months at the time,” he recalled.
During his one-month training session before setting out on the mission, he said he and others had to be equipped with language, rescue, haircutting, cooking and mechanical skills besides their farming know-how.
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