The government announced plans Tuesday to designate an additional 13 industrial complexes for a complete makeover that will help not only enhance their competitiveness but also improve their attractiveness to young workers.
The move comes amid an expansion of a government program, launched last year, to modernize the country’s aging industrial complexes.
Eight industrial complexes have already been named with the work to improve their working and living conditions expected to start in the second half of the year, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.
“Once the modernization program starts to move forward, it will help enhance the competitiveness of industrial complexes while also strengthening their functions as an industrial, commercial and residential area,” the ministry said in a press release.
South Korea currently operates 1,003 industrial complexes, including 41 run by the state, which housed a total of 80,547 businesses as of September 2014.
Under the modernization program, the government plans to raise 1.2 trillion won ($1.09 billion), together with private firms to be used in improving the working and living conditions of industrial complexes that will include the construction of 10,000 new housing units, a move specifically aimed at attracting new, young workers to industrial complexes.
In 2015 alone, the government plans to spend some 440 billion won for modernization of the eight industrial complexes selected last year, the ministry said.
It will name an additional nine industrial complexes subject to an overhaul this year and four others in 2016. (Yonhap)
