1. [Senior Employment]
On the 16th in accordance with Senior’s employment week, the Department of Labor selected 5 outstanding companies that hire seniors for an award. Of those companies 3 were located in Gyeonggi. Compared to other provinces Gyeonggi is a step ahead in providing work for seniors.
The more time that goes by, the problem of youth unemployment and the problem of seniors’ unemployment gets worse. Despite all this, companies within the province actively making use of the senior workforce.
We visited one of the outstanding companies selected by the Department of Labor.
Pre-seniors, and seniors make up almost 20% of the workforce here.
Further, this business hires retirees and makes efforts to hire seniors as new recruits. Korean society is aging rapidly with problems emerging for those that retire under the age limit. Businesses’ reconsideration and society’s awareness is needed in order to actively make use of seniors broad experience base.

2. [Haeng Gung Path]
The road leading to Suwon’s Hwaseong Haeng Gung is alive with signboard maintenance work and is seeing much change. A small art exhibition is also being held at the Haeng Gung Path, which is getting a face lift.
The road leading towards Hwaseong Haeng Gung was classified as a culturally protected area not allowing for development, and stagnating commercial rights to the area. Also, in the past it served as a simple foot path for Hwaseong visitors.
Suwon and the Cultural Heritage Administration has made great efforts to change the appearance of the path with ‘the good life village project’ which breaths new life into the history and culture of the Haeng Gung Path.
10 artists working out of Suwon participated in changing the signboards in the Haeng Gung Path area. They are creating a sign which depicts a historic national ceremony of government officials and signs with other Haeng Gung Path themes.
Further from the 24th through the 30th in an empty store next to the Haeng Gung Path, at ‘The Empty House along the Haeng Gung Path’ art exhibition the work of 10 artists is on display. And there are various hands-on activities like making a Sotdae, a folk traditional woodcraft that has a long stem with a bird on top used to celebrate happy events. Meanwhile the artists have put in a lot of effort to revive the Haeng Gung Path.

3. [ “Thank You” Card]
Using this credit card in Gyeonggi those visiting resorts, museums or other tourist attractions in the province are entitled to a discount.
Gyeonggi Province and Shinhan Bank concluded a contract to newly mint the ‘Thank You’ credit card, which offers a discount when used at various tourist attractions and related facilities.
This credit card not only offers discounts for gas and movie tickets, but beginning from the end of December, thanks to the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization’s ‘Gyeonggi Tourism integrated reservation system’ within the province one can expect to receive a 10 to 50% discount when making a reservation and paying for accommodations using the card.
Gyeonggi plans to expand the number of participating stores offering the discount to include more than 200 tourist related facilities including houses for rent, resorts, and museums.
Further, cultural performances will also fall under the sphere of participating venues.
In step with realigning its focus to accommodate the market, the province decided to come out with this credit card to be used with a related site that has been developed.

4. [Charge it!]
When taking the intercity bus in Gyeonggi passengers will now be able to pay the fare with a credit card that has the function of a deferred payment transit card. This is expected to make travel more convenient for passengers.
Gyeonggi will soon complete the installation of the deferred payment transit card system making way for a new era in intercity transit bus cards by the end of December.
For the first time in the nation, Gyeonggi introduced a prepaid transit card to use for intercity bus travel in 2005, and will soon introduce a deferred payment transit card system after more testing.
As a result, about 55% of the 900 intercity buses in the province will be equipped to accommodate travelers toting deferred payment transit cards.
All of the airport buses that go back and forth to Incheon Airport from within the province will be equipped with the new system increasing the convenience of passengers using the airport limousine service.
Using a deferred payment transit card, the inconvenience of once having to have cash on hand is now a thing of the past, and the bus fare that one pays throughout the year with the card can be deducted from one’s income tax annually.

5. [City Gas serviced]
Yangpyeong, Gapyeong, Yeoncheon, Gwangju City, and Twechon myeon in Gyeonggi that previously were not serviced with city gas, will begin to receive service starting next year.
Gyeonggi concluded a contract with 3 city gas providers including Daehan City Gas to begin the early stages of providing city gas to Yangpyeong, Gapyeong, Yeoncheon, Gwangju City, and Twechon myeon.
S ? MOU concluded allowing for 31 cities and counties to be provided with city gas
Gyeonggi Provincial Office Briefing Room (November 26)
Accordingly, these places that did not previously have access to city gas will have city gas phased in from next year, with all areas covered by 2010.
Most of these areas didn’t have business value for gas companies and so up until now they were not supplied with city gas. Residents here had to make do with oil, briquets, LPG gas or other methods for their heating and cooking needs.
In the future, the cost to supply city gas will total about 48.6 billion won which would be completely covered by the 3 gas companies.
From the city gas company side it would require a large investment and the early stages of supplying gas would be a burden, however, once the supply lines are in place it would be worthwhile and they have decided to take this step briskly.
The province will start with 15,000 households by 2010 and then expand the supply each year and plans to capture the highest city gas propagation rate in the country.

6. [Universal Studios]
Universal Studios, a world-class American theme park is to be built in Hwaseong.
For the arrangements to be made, Gyeonggi and Universal Studios concluded a Memorandum of Understanding today.
Today, Gyeonggi concluded an investment memorandum of understanding with Universal Studios and Universal Studios Korea to develop a theme park.
At the signing ceremony were the Gyeonggi Provincial Mayor, the Hwaseong Mayor, the KOWACO CEO and the director of USK Property Holdings which has an exclusive agreement with the Universal Studios theme park Korea project.
The province and Universal ultimately decided on the area near the Songsan Green City in Hwaseong Gyeonggi as the construction site for the Universal Studios theme park.
The Hwaseong Universal Studios will be 470,000 square meters in size more than twice the size of universal studios in the US. On the grounds, a theme park, and a total of 8 facilities including entertainment amenities, restaurants, and hotels will be included in line with the type of resort Hwaseong is pursuing, one that will accommodate guests staying the night.

7. [ Health Center]
The Sangroksu Health Center in Ansan, Gyeonggi is gaining much attention by offering many things to see and high quality service to boot.
The Ansan, Gyeonggi Sangroksu Health care center which opened its doors in September is a leader in breaking away from the image of the standard gloomy-looking health care centers. This one boasts a modern design, the latest in medical facilities and various services.
The outer wall made of reinforced glass provides an open-minded feeling, and the herb garden near the building even makes mere onlookers comfortable.
The inside interior of the building has places for children to study by inspection about the farming culture of former times and other programs. It also includes an oriental treatment clinic, an oral health clinic, and a health promotion clinic making up most of the many facilities for those who come to the health center for treatment.
Since the Sangroksu Health Center has been newly rebuilt, more than 800 patients a day make their way to the center, more than twice the number of previous patients.