Gwangju Dong-gu Selected for Ministry of Environment's 'Smart Green City' Contest... Secures 10 Billion KRW

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Park Seon-gang] Dong-gu, Gwangju Metropolitan City (Mayor Im Taek) announced on the 29th that it was the only district among the five autonomous districts in Gwangju to be selected for the Ministry of Environment’s ‘Smart Green City Contest Project,’ securing 10 billion won.

In particular, Mayor Im Taek of Dong-gu played a pivotal role by actively participating from on-site investigations to presentation evaluations.

This project is part of the Green New Deal sector of the Korean New Deal policy and was the first contest project promoted by the Ministry of Environment to discover region-customized climate and environmental improvement projects. It was conducted targeting 243 metropolitan and basic local governments nationwide, and among them, 20 places including Dong-gu were selected as ‘problem-solving’ projects.

Since declaring this year as the inaugural year of ‘Making Dong-gu a Garbage-Free District,’ Dong-gu has achieved remarkable results by promoting various cleaning administrative innovation projects. Representative examples include designation of resource circulation pilot villages, training and operation of resource circulation interpreters, creation of fragrant resident participation gardens, formation of resident councils, and establishment of climate environment governance.

The ‘Smart Green City Contest Project’ proceeded in the order of ▲document screening ▲on-site investigation ▲presentation evaluation ▲final selection, and was evaluated focusing on business vision and goals, innovation of business plans, presence of community foundation, performance management and sustainability, and linkage possibilities with existing New Deal projects.

With the selection in this contest project, Dong-gu plans to invest a total project cost of 10 billion won over two years starting next year to promote ‘resident-participatory green transition projects’ based on regional characteristics, including ▲resource circulation creation project for zero-waste villages ▲urban climate resilience enhancement projects such as alley greening ▲resource circulation eco-center establishment for community-based resource circulation education and practice.

They also plan to accelerate the creation of a ‘smart resource circulation village’ incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) functions.

This is expected to be the first case to create a new model of a climate environment crisis response and resource circulation green transition city.

Through this, it is expected to create an advanced model of Korean Green New Deal resource circulation projects, including economic effects and job creation, greenhouse gas reduction and climate change response environmental effects, resident-led smart green city creation, and artificial intelligence (AI) big data management.

Mayor Im Taek of Dong-gu said, “The selection for this contest project is a valuable achievement made possible by the active cooperation of related organizations and residents, combined with the passion of public officials for cleaning administration,” and added, “We will develop a sustainable future eco-friendly model where humans and the environment coexist in line with the government’s Green New Deal project direction and create an opportunity to spread it nationwide.”

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