Increase in Small-Scale Individual Forest Owners... 2.18 Million Last Year, Average 1.9 Hectares per Person

2020 National Mountain Owner Status Data. Provided by the Korea Forest Service

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] The number of forest owners possessing private forests, even in small scales, is increasing every year.

According to the Korea Forest Service's "2020 National Forest Owner Status" released on the 31st, as of last year, there were approximately 2.18 million private forest owners nationwide, with an average private forest area of about 1.9 hectares per person.

In particular, the number of private forest owners has increased by around 10,000 annually over the past three years. The number steadily rose from 2.164 million in 2018 to 2.174 million in 2019, and 2.181 million in 2020.

The majority of private forest owners are individuals. Typically, forest owners are categorized by ownership type into individuals, corporations, clans, and foreigners. Among these, individual owners accounted for 2 million last year (an increase of about 6,000 from the previous year), representing 92% of all private forest owners.

Additionally, among individual owners, so-called "local owners" who reside in the same city or province as their owned forest numbered approximately 949,000 (43.9%) last year. Although this is a slight decrease from about 950,000 in 2019, the proportion of local owners is gradually increasing, according to the Korea Forest Service's analysis.

Im Mira, Planning and Coordination Officer at the Korea Forest Service, stated, "The increase in small-scale private forest owners and the proportion of local owners in urban areas indicates a growing public interest in forest ownership. The Korea Forest Service will analyze the causes of changes in private forest ownership and actively utilize this data in formulating private forest policies."

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