Seocho-gu Wins 'International Business Award' for 4 Consecutive Years

Gold Prize 2 Cases: Yangjaecheon Cheoncheon Tour, Dementia Safety House; Bronze Prize 1 Case: Seocho Smart Senior Project

[Asia Economy Reporter Jong-il Park] Seocho-gu (Mayor Eunhee Jo) won the International Business Awards hosted by the Stevie Awards for the fourth consecutive year on the 14th.

Known as the "Oscars of the business world," this competition is a prestigious international awards ceremony that evaluates various business achievements by companies and organizations worldwide over the course of a year.

This year marks the 17th International Business Awards, which saw over 3,800 entries from 63 countries worldwide competing despite the COVID-19 pandemic situation.

As a result of evaluations by about 250 judges from various countries, Seocho-gu won a total of three awards (two Golds, one Bronze), earning the honor of the most awards among local governments in Korea. Starting with one Silver and one Bronze in 2017, two Golds in 2018, one Silver in 2019, and continuing to achieve top results through 2020, Seocho-gu’s four consecutive years of awards is even more meaningful. This is the record for the most awards won by any local government nationwide.

The projects for which Seocho won Gold awards are ▲Yangjaecheon Cheoncheon Tour and ▲Dementia Safety House.

The Yangjaecheon Cheoncheon Tour project means "a tour to slowly enjoy the stream" and is a river experience environmental education program where participants can leisurely enjoy nature at Yangjaecheon and feel the importance of river conservation. It was designated as an excellent environmental education program by the Minister of Environment on January 7.

The Dementia Safety House is Korea’s first customized model house for dementia patients. It is designed to be safe and convenient while enhancing the cognitive abilities of dementia patients, and was created as a reference for families with dementia patients when decorating their homes.

The judging panel commented on the Yangjaecheon Cheoncheon Tour, which won Gold, saying, “It is a very meaningful project realized with a sophisticated and perfect tone. We hope you will do your best for this important project. We expect amazing results through continuous passion.”

Also, the Dementia Safety House received praise: “With a fantastic idea, Seocho-gu created the Dementia Safety House to solve community problems. We hope this project continues, expands further, and becomes more widely known.”

Next, the project that won the Bronze award is the Seocho Smart Senior project.

The Seocho Smart Senior project is a lifestyle-oriented digital education experience program for seniors, allowing them to experience various new technologies such as VR (virtual reality), advanced robots, and one-person media. It is a project that helps bridge the digital information gap for seniors, who are an information-vulnerable group, and acts as a catalyst for social participation and communication. The judging panel evaluated it as “a really good policy for seniors. It is innovative and truly necessary senior policy.”

Seocho-gu Mayor Eunhee Jo stated, “Seocho’s ‘Lifestyle-Oriented 1℃’ administration is now recognized not only domestically but also internationally.” She added, “We will not be satisfied with winning the International Business Awards for four consecutive years or holding the record for the most awards among local governments nationwide. We will continue to strive to implement innovative lifestyle-oriented 1℃ administration for our residents.”

Meanwhile, Seocho-gu also won the Grand Prize and Excellence Award in the fields of income gap resolution and ultra-aging response, respectively, at the ‘2020 National Basic Local Government Manifesto Best Practice Competition’ hosted by the Korea Manifesto Practice Headquarters.

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