Fostering the 'Gangdong-type Social Economy Specialized Leather Fashion Industry'

Leather Fashion Startup Support Center Reborn as Gangdong-type Social Economy Specialized Hub

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jong-il] Gangdong-gu (Mayor Lee Jeong-hoon) will continue to operate the Leather Fashion Startup Support Center, which has been promoted to establish a youth-centered leather fashion industry collaboration system, as a hub for fostering the 'Gangdong-type social economy specialized leather fashion industry.'

Earlier, on the 28th of last month, Gangdong-gu held a signing ceremony with Koiro, which operates the Seoul Leather Fashion Startup Support Center, opening the first door to building the Gangdong-type leather fashion cluster.

The Gangdong-gu Leather Fashion Startup Support Center has played a central role in youth-centered leather fashion businesses since 2017, when Gangdong-gu was selected as a social economy special zone by Seoul City. A 'social economy special zone' refers to a region that creates sustainable social economy success cases by developing business models combining local population and industrial characteristics to solve regional problems.

However, as the special zone project ended in December last year, considering Gangdong-gu's regional characteristics where more than 30% of Seoul's leather industry companies are concentrated, and the successful case of the Seoul Leather Fashion Startup Support Center, an agreement was made to continue operating it as a Gangdong-type social economy hub.

In particular, Gangdong-gu's leather fashion industry is a rare case different from other social economy businesses focused on welfare or services, as it allows youth and local industry workers to coexist and develop together, making it especially meaningful.

This year marks the first year of the local government project, and with the goal of job creation and revitalizing the local economy, plans are in place to establish a safety net for the local manufacturing industry.

Specifically, the plans include ▲discovering youth social economy actors and startup incubating ▲supporting education for fostering specialized industries ▲nurturing local social economy manufacturing networks ▲operating online and offline platforms ▲participating in domestic and international exhibitions, and providing promotion and sales channel support for entry into large distribution companies.

Lee Jeong-hoon, Mayor of Gangdong-gu, said, “Since this is a rare case where a Seoul city project continues as a district project, we will spare no support to establish it as an excellent case of youth and social economy manufacturing within the region,” adding, “I hope that the young will and creative ideas of youth in the region become a new vitality, laying a great foundation for job creation and growth support of the local leather industry.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.