Korea must form total marketing and investment organization

Recently, China has tried to enter the WTO, designated its maritime industry as a key national industry, and actively pushed to foster it by developing mega sized ports and introducing free trade zones behind them.

Following Chinese policy steps, global carriers transformed their Asian services, focusing on China. Terminal operating companies also attracted lots of ocean cargoes to China through marketing activites. Shanghai, the largest port in China, has involved over 1,500 international companies with additional 1,000 worldwide logistic companies investing there. Shanghai has reached levels around HongKong or Singapore. Under pressure from these circumstances, Korea has to quickly grab the leadership role in East Asian logistic center policies by early activation of the Inchon International Airport and Port of Kwangyang, which have been developed to that end. For this purpose, we need to organise super-governmental agencies. At present, the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries is responsible for ports and maritime affairs, the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT) for airports and logistic centers, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy (MOCIE) for industrial park and foreign investments, adthe Ministry of Finance and Economy (MOFE) for customs free areas. This accounts for diverse national powers and unsystematic marketing policies.

On these views, Korea has to form organisations for marketing and investment, the so-called "KMFA" (Korea Marketing & Foreign Investment Administration), advocated J.K. Woo, a researcher from the Korea Maritime Institute. Kim said this organisation might be a super-governmental organisation to propel total marketing strategies forward to foreign companies and give one-stop services to foreigners for investment areas such as ports, airports, industrial parks, customs free areas, and free trade zones.