'Half' Innovation City Without Knowledge-Based Industry Jobs... Chungbuk Family Relocation Rate at 47%

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyunjung] An assessment has emerged that the innovation cities built domestically under the public institution relocation policy have shown limitations in expanding employment and improving qualitative living conditions. The analysis indicates that employment in knowledge-based industries, which is essential for sustainable urban growth, did not increase significantly, resulting in many innovation cities failing to reach their originally planned population targets.

On the 21st, Moon Yoonsang, a research fellow at the Korea Development Institute (KDI), announced these findings through a policy forum presentation titled "Effects and Policy Directions of Public Institution Relocation."

The government's public institution relocation policy was planned in 2005 and concluded in 2019 with the relocation of the last public institution (Korea Institute of Science and Technology Planning and Evaluation, Chungbuk). Research fellow Moon stated, "The main goal of the public institution relocation policy is to save direct and indirect costs of public institutions located in the metropolitan area and to promote regional balanced development through growth in underdeveloped areas." He added, "While the population and employment in innovation cities increased significantly, showing short-term results, employment in knowledge-based industries necessary for sustaining these effects in the long term did not increase, revealing limitations."

According to Moon's examination of employment effects by industry and region in innovation cities, employment increased significantly in manufacturing and local service industries, but the growth of knowledge-based industries, which could promote regional development, was not prominent, indicating a limitation.

He explained, "Focusing on the estimated coefficients of interactions after the relocation of innovation cities and institutions, it can be seen that total private employment in innovation cities increased by about 7 percentage points compared to control general cities due to the relocation of public institutions. However, when looking at the effect on knowledge industry employment, both employment and employment growth rates are not statistically significant." He added, "For regional development, growth in knowledge industries, which have a greater ripple effect on the region than manufacturing or local services, is crucial, but the relocation of public institutions had no impact on employment in knowledge industries."

Most innovation cities failed to reach their originally planned population. As of June, all innovation cities except Busan and Jeonbuk had not reached their planned populations. In particular, the Chungbuk Innovation City in Jincheon and Eumseong showed a low achievement rate, falling below 80% of the planned population, with a family relocation rate of only 47%.

Additionally, migration inflows mainly came from the metropolitan area starting in 2014, but after 2018, inflows from surrounding areas increased. Initially, external population inflows occurred, but later this appears to have accelerated the decline of surrounding regions as a side effect.

Research fellow Moon emphasized, "To sustain employment creation and population inflow in innovation cities, efforts are needed to improve qualitative living conditions by utilizing metropolitan infrastructure and human resources and to increase the employment effects of knowledge-based industries." He explained, "Since relocated public institutions provide many high-education and high-skilled jobs, priority should be given to placing public jobs in fields that can create synergy effects with the region's specialized industries."

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