Assemblyman Seo Samsuk: Farmland Disappearing at 83 Times Yeouido's Annual Average Area

Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Delays Response to Idle Farmland Status

2013 Survey Data on Idle Farmland Resources Now Useless

Seosamseok, Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker (Yeongam, Muan, Sinan, Jeollanam-do) / ⓒ Asia Economy

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Seo Young-seo] The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has been criticized for failing to properly grasp the status of idle farmland that is not being farmed and left unused.

According to the 'Idle Farmland Status Survey' data submitted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs to Seo Sam-seok, a member of the Democratic Party of Korea (Yeongam, Muan, Sinan), on the 5th, the ministry included a budget of 1 billion KRW for idle farmland resource investigation in next year's government budget for the first time in eight years.

Although Statistics Korea also surveys and announces the status of fallow and idle farmland where crops are not cultivated annually, it only conducts sample surveys without parcel-specific information, making it difficult to utilize the data for actual policy projects.

According to Article 31-3 of the Farmland Act, the farmland use status survey conducted annually by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs targets newly acquired farmland over a certain period and is implemented to detect violations of farmland use laws, thus differing in purpose and scope from the idle farmland resource investigation.

Through the idle farmland status survey, the ministry plans to interpret aerial photographs of 100,000 to 200,000 hectares of farmland, conduct on-site investigations on 20,000 to 40,000 hectares, and purchase or lease farmland selected as recoverable through public rental farmland or lease consignment projects to lease to young farmers.

The problem lies in the timing of the survey. The ministry stated, "An idle farmland resource survey was conducted in 2013, and based on that data, a sampling survey was conducted this year, but it has not been updated since then, making it unsuitable for current use," emphasizing the need to allocate a budget for the idle farmland survey.

Even if reflected in next year's budget, conducting on-site investigations and implementing policy projects based on them will take at least more than a year. The fact that the ministry is only now conducting an idle farmland status survey after an eight-year gap since the 2013 survey has drawn criticism as a delayed response.

At the time of the idle farmland status survey in 2013, the cultivated area was 1.71 million hectares, which decreased by 130,000 hectares to 1.58 million hectares in 2019, six years later. This means about 21,000 hectares of farmland, equivalent to 83 times the area of Yeouido (260 hectares annually), disappeared.

Assemblyman Seo Sam-seok said, "In a situation where a huge amount of cultivated land area decreases every year, it is very important to identify and resource farmland that is not being used for cultivation to improve food self-sufficiency rates," adding, "It is urgent to improve laws and systems to regularize the idle farmland status survey."

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