S. Korea: A Green Growth National Strategy

Three years of green growth

08-16-2011 - As U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has repeatedly emphasized, climate change is the “defining challenge of our era.” Indeed, climate change has the potential to affect everything from the health of the world economy to the health of individual citizens everywhere. In this sense, climate change is a global challenge that requires a global response.

Korea has played a significant role in the initiation and organization of this “global response.” Now, three years since President Lee Myung-bak announced “low carbon, green growth” as the national vision, Korea has made countless strides in this direction.

On a national level, after its achievements in the famous “Miracle of the Han River,” Korea has once again engaged in an attempt to revolutionize the world’s economic paradigm. On an international level, it has succeeded in transforming a national vision into a global agenda, recognized by the rest of the world as a legitimate goal for the future of modern civilization.

Following the announcement of Korea’s national vision, the Korean government has focused on realizing the ideals outlined. A green growth national strategy was established in conjunction with a five-year economic development plan (2009-2013). Based on the plan, the appropriate networks between central and local governments and the private sector were set up quickly in 2009.

In particular, the Presidential Green Growth Committee (GGC) established relations with independent GGCs in 16 different cities and provinces, while it also contributed in enacting the Basic Law on Low Carbon, Green Growth by which various institutional arrangements have been legally formalized. read more>>>