How many short-term missionaries are sent from the USA?

** Do you know any sources for figures on short-term missionaries going from the US to various countries? In particular, to Haiti?*

A. It depends on how one defines “short-term missionary.” The Mission Handbook, 2001-2003 edition, defined one “short term” category as “overseas from 1 to 4 years.”

For that definition, they noted

• 5,115 in 1992,
• 6,562 in 1996,
• 6,930 in 1999.

Then, for “short-term of 2 weeks up to 1 year,” they listed 63,995 in 1996 and 97,272 in 1999.

I don’t have a post-2003 edition Mission Handbook on my shelves, although there is one for 2010.

Perhaps if someone has a copy they could look up the numbers and email them to me.

I suspect it would be significantly higher in the 2003-2010 period, but I also suspect the number has begun to decline (although I don’t have hard evidence for this).

I don’t have specific numbers for workers sent to specific places (like Haiti, for example).