Naju City Holds the 2nd Meeting of the Yeongsangang Committee

[Naju=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yukbong] Naju City, Jeollanam-do (Mayor Kang In-gyu) announced on the 5th that it held the 2nd meeting of the Yeongsan River Committee, a public-private joint committee to find fundamental solutions to the environmental and ecological issues of the Yeongsan River, at the city hall.

The Yeongsan River ecological restoration policy task is one of Naju City's five leading policy tasks established to derive practical alternatives for the Yeongsan River's ecological issues, which cause serious environmental problems such as green algae, odor, and water pollution every year.

Previously, through domestic and international cases of estuary dam openings, including the Nakdong River estuary dam promoted as a national agenda, the main point is to prepare the optimal seawater circulation plan following the opening of the Mokpo estuary dam built in 1981 and restore the Yeongsan River and Yeongsanho Lake to their natural state where life once thrived, utilizing them as new growth engine resources for the region.

The meeting was attended by Mayor Kang In-gyu, the standing chairman of the public-private joint committee, Professor Jeon Seung-su of the Department of Earth Environment Science at Chonnam National University, the co-chairman, and Park Jong-gi, former policy advisory member of the National Assembly Environmental Forum.

Newly appointed members including Kim Do-hyung, Secretary General of the Yeongsan River Revival Network, Myung Ho, Deputy Director of the Ecological Horizon Research Institute, Baek Seung-ho, Senior Researcher at the Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology, and Lee Man-sil, Standing Representative of the Jeonnam Climate Environment Network, also participated in the discussions.

The committee reviewed opinions and detailed tasks based on the rich experience and academic knowledge of experts from various fields regarding the commencement of the ‘Comprehensive Plan Research Service for Yeongsan River Ecological Restoration,’ which serves as the blueprint for the policy task.

This research will promote ‘collection of basic data on water quality and ecological environment in the Yeongsan River basin,’ ‘prediction of seawater circulation impact using numerical models,’ and ‘analysis of domestic and international cases of estuarine ecosystem restoration through seawater circulation.’

In particular, when establishing seawater circulation scenarios, the plan focuses on predicting and analyzing anticipated issues such as salt intrusion into farmland and deriving the optimal seawater circulation plan through expert advisory meetings.

The city plans to form a public-private governance system encompassing central government ministries, local governments, specialized institutions, academia, and civic groups, and to build a public-private-academic cooperation system to ensure that Yeongsan River ecological restoration is adopted as a national agenda in the next presidential election.

Along with the committee, the city also intends to concretely promote the ‘4 Major Rivers Re-naturalization’ starting from the Yeongsan River through solidarity with expert groups experienced in seawater circulation research not only domestically in the Han River, Geum River, and Nakdong River but also internationally.

Mayor Kang In-gyu said, “To embark on the grand journey of restoring the Yeongsan River, we will establish a broad governance system including the Yeongsan River basin’s metropolitan and basic local governments, environmental and civic groups to prepare fundamental alternatives,” adding, “We will do our best to ensure that the ecological restoration of the Yeongsan River becomes a sustainable growth engine for regional development.”

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