President Park Geun-hye has emphasized agriculture as a “future growth industry” and promoted the use of free trade agreements (FTAs) as an opportunity to increase exports. 

President Park said, “The agriculture sector can be transformed into a new industry through a combination of smart technology.” She was speaking during a discussion meeting about the future of the agricultural sector on November 19. She said that the government will foster agriculture as an industry with significant future growth potential by using Korea’s world-leading technology prowess in information and communications technologies (ICTs) and the network of FTAs it has signed with the three major economic blocs of the world. 

“To secure competitiveness amid the big changes and challenges of opening our markets, the agricultural sector needs to develop into one backed by the integration of technology and capital. Through the combination of smart technologies and IT, the agriculture sector can become a new industry,” said the president.

“We need to develop new technologies and new products through research and development, and create new markets and more added value through a combination of ICT and biotechnology (BT). We need to explore new markets overseas by developing the agricultural sector into a 'senary' sector of the economy by combining the secondary and tertiary sectors,” she said, referring to manufacturing and services. 

Park visited an exhibition on the future of the agricultural industry and discussed measures that would lay the foundation for agriculture, helping it to increase competitiveness and exports by joining with high-end technologies. She spoke with staff at the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation center and stressed the efforts being made to stabilize the price of agricultural products on both the supply and demand sides.