Sejong City Invests 22 Billion KRW in Youth Employment and Housing Policy Projects

[Asia Economy Reporter Jeong Il-woong] Sejong City will invest a budget of 22 billion KRW in policy projects for local youth.

The city announced on the 31st that it will establish and implement the ‘2021 Sejong City Youth Policy,’ consisting of 33 tasks across five areas: youth employment, housing, education, culture and welfare, and participation and rights.

The implementation plan was established based on the ‘1st Basic Youth Policy Plan’ announced by the Office for Government Policy Coordination in December last year. The core of the plan is designed to support the overall life of youth, including housing, education, and culture, moving away from youth policies focused solely on employment.

Representative tasks include ▲region-led youth employment projects ▲distribution of Sejong-type youth rental share houses ▲support for customized online and offline lifelong education for youth ▲youth mental health projects ▲expansion of the Sejong Youth Center ▲operation of the Youth Policy Network.

Among these, the ‘region-led youth employment project’ is primarily implemented to discover and provide jobs suitable for youth and encourage them to settle in the region.

The share house distribution supplies rental housing to youth with vulnerable housing conditions at rents 50% to 70% cheaper than the surrounding market price. This year, 15 units are planned to be supplied near Korea National University of Arts, Korea University, and Hongik University.

The lifelong education support project focuses on supporting the growth of youth settled in the region and laying the foundation for urban development. To this end, the city plans to operate programs necessary for career design such as employment and entrepreneurship in connection with the Sejong Citizen University ‘Jiphyeonjeon.’

The youth health counseling center project, which comforts youth experiencing mental stress due to academic, employment, or workplace issues, will be expanded, and self-help groups or psychological therapy programs linked with universities will also be promoted.

Additionally, the city plans to build an expanded governance where youth can actively participate in policies and use it as a communication channel by forming the ‘Sejong Youth Policy Network.’ The Sejong Youth Policy Network will form its second term in June and will play a role in discovering and investigating youth issues while seeking improvement measures.

Furthermore, based on the ‘Youth Basic Ordinance,’ the youth policy intermediary support organization ‘Youth Center,’ established last year, will expand and promote Sejong-type youth projects to 17 tasks across five areas this year.

Lee Chun-hee, Mayor of Sejong City, said, “Sejong is a young city with an average age of 37.4 years and is the only region outside the metropolitan area where the youth population is increasing nationwide.” He added, “Through the implementation of this year’s youth policy plan, the city will support local youth to lead the policy process and actively strive to improve the quality of life for youth in areas such as employment, housing, and culture.”

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