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Editor’s note: This is the second in a new Jeju Weekly series providing readers with analysis of hot topics that appear daily in the local Korean-language press. In future we will invite guest writers to provide different perspectives and expert opinions for this ongoing series. We hope our readers will enjoy this wider window on Jeju politics, culture and more.
Free school meals for Jeju students
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| ▲ Photo courtesy Korean government archive |
You may wonder how such a mundane topic as free school meals can escalate into a political hot potato and even be considered a political litmus test throughout the country, but that is exactly what has happened in Korea since early this year.
The administrative self-governing committee at the Jeju Provincial Assembly passed legislation on Sept. 7 that would provide free school meals for all of the island's students. If the bill is ratified in the main assembly meeting scheduled for Sept. 20, over 94,000 Jeju students, including toddlers at daycare centers, will be able to enjoy free meals. Currently 26,300 students at schools mostly clustered in the island's rural areas or attending special schools enjoy free meals in school cafeterias, which accounts for some 28 percent of the island's total students.
The committee also aims to promote the island's organic farming with the ordinance by stating that school cafeterias must use organic produce, preferably grown on the island's farms. The legislation, the first of its kind ever enacted by any provincial assembly in Korea, was originally proposed on Oct. 14, 2009, by a petition signed by 3,886 islanders. The bill legislated this month has expanded the number of beneficiaries by adding toddlers at daycare centers up to 5 years of age to the top of the original proposal.
The matter of free school meals emerged as one of the hottest issues in the nation's political arena when Kim Sang Gon, who adopted the issue as his key campaign platform, won a by-election in April 2009 for the position of superintendent of schools for Gyeonggi province. Since his victory last year, nearly all of the nation's liberal candidates, including the current Jeju Governor, Woo Keun Min, pledged in the June election to provide free school meals for the students, while painting conservative candidates as inhumane adversaries to juvenile welfare. The nation’s liberal parties went on to win a landslide victory in the June election.
The conservative Grand National Party, on the contrary, proposed to expand the number of beneficiaries gradually, starting with students from low-income families. Liberal politicians and activist groups attacked the party’s stance, however, criticizing that selective provisioning of free meals in school cafeterias will single out and humiliate students among their classmates, and would effectively brand them as poor beneficiaries of the national welfare service. The Liberal Democratic Party proposed instead that schools should provide free meals for every student, regardless of financial status.
Though welcomed by almost every party concerned in the island, the legislation, if passed, is expected to be problematic for officials responsible for allocating the island's budget. Jeju’s provincial government will need to set aside an additional 26 billion won to provide free school meals for the island's entire student population.
Cha Woo Jin, budgetary planning manager for the Jeju provincial government, hinted that even if the legislation is passed, only a gradual expansion of the benefit may be inevitable due to Jeju's chronic budget constraints. In this case, the first wave of beneficiaries would be toddlers and elementary school students, followed by middle school and high school students.
Retrofitting Jeju’s twin gates by 2012
Have you noticed the concrete girders and scaffolding at Jeju International Airport?
Jeju provincial government had earlier proposed to build a new international airport on the island by 2025, but instead the Korea Airport Corporation is currently remodeling Jeju International Airport in piecemeal upgrades. The current airport is projected to reach its maximum capacity by 2025 despite a planned expansion, according to the finding of a latest governmental survey sponsored by Seoul.
The Korea Airport Corporation said on Aug. 24 that it will expand the terminal’s passenger handling capacity from 10 million people per year to nearly 23 million by July 2012, requiring an investment of 48 billion won. The airport’s total domestic terminal space will increase by 52 percent after upgrades. The airline check-in counters will be doubled to 62. The terminal will also have 13 X-ray screening gates, seven boarding bridges and seven baggage carousels after remodeling.
The extra terminal space will be rented out to restaurants, and a separate building complete with restrooms and a customer lounge will be built in the space of the current parking lot allowing rental car companies to operate their service booths near the terminal. Currently, rental car customers must take a shuttle to pick up their cars from the various private garages located far from the terminal, or simply wander about the maze of cars in the airport parking lot looking for a rental car agent.
The total airport capacity after remodeling will accomidate up to 25 million people per year by 2025. Following the expansion, the airport will be able to house Boeing 747-400 jumbo planes.
Investment in the island’s key transportation infrastructure doesn’t stop at the airport. In a separate statement released a day earlier, the Jeju provincial government said that it will build another passenger terminal near the current port in anticipation of the increasing number of cruise ships that will be docking at Jeju.
The provincial government will invest 17 billion won by 2012 to build what they say will become a new tourist landmark on the island. Initially, they planned to attract private investors to build the terminal but turned to Seoul after it became evident that no investor was expected to come aboard the project.
UNESCO World Natural Heritage Center
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| ▲ An artist's depiction of UNESCO World Heritage Center. Photo courtesy Jeju Special Self-Governing Province |
Though islanders are still largely divided over the construction of a UNESCO World Natural Heritage Center on Jeju, ground was broken on Aug. 27 in preparation for the new center near Geomun Oreum.
“The groundbreaking ceremony today signals Jeju's commitment to implement the pledges made to UNESCO to preserve and manage the island's Natural Heritages,” said Oh Ik Cheol, chief of the office for the UNESCO World Natural Heritage at the ceremony, which was attended by approximately 500 local residents. “We will seek financial support from Seoul more proactively to advance the Center to a northeast Asian hub of World Natural Heritage Sites in the region,” Oh added.
Indeed, Jeju requires a great deal of financial support from Seoul if it is to complete construction of the center by June 2012. The Jeju provincial government will pay for 70 percent of the estimated 29 billion won construction cost, with Seoul financing the remaining 30 percent. However, the local government is reportedly in negotiation with Seoul to potentially increase its share to nearly half the total budget.
The two-storey, 7,335 square-meter center will house a main exhibition hall, an audio-visual diorama and a research and education lab. Part of the center will be set aside as future office space for international organizations.
Skeptics of the center question the merit of constructing a concrete building to promote the virtue of Jeju's natural wonders. Others are doubtful that the center will be able to come up with enough relevant content to display about the island that is commensurate with the gleaming ambition of the concrete hardware. Local environmentalists are especially wary of the giant parking lot set to be built directly at the foot of beautiful Geomun Oreum.
Jeju was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List as a World Natural Heritage Site on June 27, 2007, under the designation of Jeju Volcanic Island and Lava Tubes. As of April 2009, the list includes 890 properties forming part of the cultural and natural heritage which the World Heritage Committee considers as having outstanding universal value.
The UNESCO designation has since served as a push in the direction of reinvigorating Jeju’s economy, and Jeju’s tourism sector in particular. According to statistics released by the Jeju provincial government, the number of visitors to the sites has tripled since the listing, while the number of foreign visitors has doubled.
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