S.Korea to raise 7 service industries to boost growth potential

South Korea planned to raise seven promising service industries, including health care and finance, as part of the efforts to boost growth potential of the economy, which is being feared to plunge into the low-growth trap, the Finance Ministry said Tuesday.

President Park Geun-hye chaired the meeting for promoting trade and investment, where some 180 businessmen, ministers and heads of related agencies participated, according to the Finance Ministry.

In the past 10 years, local companies rapidly increased overseas investment while reducing investment at home on the back of higher production costs and irrational regulations.

The government planned to create jobs and enhance productivity of the overall economy by helping boost major service industries, including healthcare, tourism, contents, education, finance, logistics and software.

To boost the healthcare sector, the government will support the establishment of for-profit affiliates by non-profit hospitals. It was anticipated to help hospitals make money through the affiliates and induce hospitals to provide better healthcare services without worries about deficits.

Seoul will also provide incentives with foreign hospitals to drive them to make investments and set up clinics here in the country, while helping local hospitals attract foreign patients.

For the tourism and contents industry, South Korea will help build infrastructure necessary to spread the so-called Korean Wave, or cultural contents such as K-Pop, while helping develop new tourism projects such as theme park and tourism contents in Han River and major mountains.

The government will make efforts to attract globally famous educational agencies to the country, and streamline regulations on foreign students wanting to study in Seoul.

To foster the finance industry, the government will help speed up promising companies going public and bolster retirement funds by improving regulations. Furthermore, funds will be created to provide finance assistance to the promising service industries.

Land to build the logistics complex will be supplied more to help expand the logistics industry, while upgrading the parcel delivery service. The role of the Incheon International Airport as a logistics hub will be strengthened.

To attract private investment into the software sector, South Korea will create the so-called cluster complex, where personnel, logistics and corporate infrastructure are centered.