Establishment of Digital Sex Crime Response System and Other Initiatives: 30 Ministries Request 532.3 Billion Won in Next Year's 국민참여예산

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Joo Sang-don] The Ministry of Economy and Finance announced on the 15th that a total of 156 projects from 30 ministries requested 532.3 billion KRW through the 2021 Citizen Participatory Budget.

The Citizen Participatory Budget system allows citizens to directly propose budget projects and participate in prioritization decisions. It was first introduced in 2018. The number of projects for next year's Citizen Participatory Budget increased by 63% compared to the previous year, and the requested amount doubled.

Based on a total of 1,164 proposals received from citizens over the past year, the government identified 116 projects through eligibility screening and project refinement processes conducted with each ministry and private experts. Additionally, through discussion-type citizen participation methods, including online debates and expert forums on key issues such as responses to sexual crimes and future core growth industries, 40 projects were discovered.

Next year's Citizen Participatory Budget includes many projects addressing social issues and daily life needs, such as establishing a digital sexual crime response system (6 billion KRW), building an integrated disaster management resource system (2.1 billion KRW), developing a drone-based forest and marine monitoring system (6.1 billion KRW), and smart loan applications for small business policy funds (2.9 billion KRW).

It also includes various projects that can realize community development and social values, such as installing an integrated call center for the youth helpline 1388 (11.6 billion KRW), supporting meal expenses for youth using shelters (3.8 billion KRW), operating coordinators for children of immigrants (4.4 billion KRW), and establishing a support system for workplace power harassment victims (1.2 billion KRW), targeting youth, multicultural families, and low-income groups.

Budgets were also requested to enhance economic vitality through discovering future growth industries, supporting startups, and strengthening corporate competitiveness, including the development of explainable medical artificial intelligence (AI) technology (2.8 billion KRW) and fostering startups that solve social problems using public data AI (15 billion KRW).

The government plans to include the projects requested through the Citizen Participatory Budget in the 2021 government budget proposal after discussions with the Budget Citizen Participation Group and project preference surveys, and submit it to the National Assembly by September 3rd following the Cabinet meeting.

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