Seoul to promote green industry to overcome economic downturn

SEOUL, Dec. 22 (Yonhap) -- South Korea will invest billions of dollars to foster
environmental industries and create jobs to help ride out the global financial
crisis, the Environment Ministry said Monday.

"The new plan aims at overcoming the economic crisis through a 'green new deal'
and satisfying people's enthusiasm for clean environment projects," the ministry
said in its 2009 policy report to the president. "We will create some 43,000 jobs
in the environmental sectors and boost environmental safety."
To achieve a prompt and direct effect, the ministry will front-load 1.8 trillion
won (US$1.4 billion) or 63.9 percent of next year's budget, in the first half of
2009, it said.
It will also raise funds to support environmental industries suffering from the
financial crunch, giving them 10 billion won to encourage export and 65 billion
won to invest in facilities.
About 43,000 people will get jobs at national parks and in environmental think
tanks that conduct research on climate change, the ministry said.
The government said it will establish concrete plans for 'low carbon, green
growth' projects, a new goal of the Lee Myung-bak administration, including
carbon labelling and data basing of greenhouse gas emissions.
Companies will be required to label their products with carbon emission figures
and follow government guidelines for environmental effect assessment, said the
ministry.
South Korea is one of the countries that may have to join a worldwide mandatory
greenhouse gas reduction plan in 2012.
"To cope with climate change that the entire world is trying to prevent, and to
realize green growth, we have to concentrate on the nation's efforts to come up
with efficient policies and to carry out wide-ranging reform in the field," the
ministry said in the report.
brk@yna.co.kr
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