Korea Disease Control Association Urges Fair Trade Commission to Investigate Unfair Competition by Large Corporations

Lee Cheol, Chairman of the Large Corporation Market Entry Measures Committee of the Korea Quarantine Association (center), and committee members visited the Fair Trade Commission at the Government Sejong Complex on the 1st to deliver an appeal urging an investigation into unfair practices by large corporations.
[Photo by Korea Quarantine Association]

[Asia Economy Reporter Junhyung Lee] The Korea Pest Control Association's Large Corporation Market Entry Countermeasures Committee announced on the 1st that it visited the Fair Trade Commission at the government Sejong Government Complex and delivered an appeal letter to Chairman Seongwook Cho of the Fair Trade Commission, urging an investigation into unfair competition by large corporations in the pest control and disinfection market.

The Korea Pest Control Association is a non-profit organization under the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Recently, the association formed the Countermeasures Committee to jointly respond to industry issues arising from the entry of large corporations and created this appeal letter.

Through the appeal letter, the committee stated, "The pest control and disinfection market consists of about 10,000 small businesses with annual sales under 100 million KRW," adding, "The total market size is about 1 trillion KRW annually, but ultra-large corporations with annual sales reaching 100 trillion KRW have unfairly entered the market." It further added, "They are even funneling work to their group affiliates and conducting indiscriminate sales activities by utilizing affiliate infrastructure."

The committee also claimed that not only customers but also technology theft is occurring. It pointed out that large corporations are entering the market without specialized technology or workforce training and are stealing core information such as research and development (R&D) technologies from existing specialized companies. In this regard, it was reported that a GS Group affiliate is under prosecution investigation.

Accordingly, in October this year, the committee delivered an appeal letter to the heads of six major corporations including SK, GS, Lotte, KT, and Netmarble, demanding a halt to their sprawling market entry. Netmarble accepted the committee’s appeal and immediately announced that it would not engage in disinfection services. On the other hand, the committee explained that the other large corporations are aggressively expanding their disinfection-related businesses. After receiving the Korea Pest Control Association’s appeal letter, SK Group changed its company name and announced plans to include pest control and disinfection as core businesses and increase sales more than fivefold.

The committee holds the position that existing small and micro businesses cannot keep up with the volume offensive sales tactics of large corporations utilizing affiliate infrastructure. The committee said, "SK, with total sales of 140 trillion KRW, is trying to grow its group size by targeting rats, cockroaches, ants, and viruses," adding, "They started new businesses as a new source of revenue amid the COVID-19 crisis."

Furthermore, the committee pointed out that large corporations are pushing small disinfection operators into the crisis of becoming subcontractors. The committee stated, "We hope that Korean large corporations will adopt business methods and corporate ethics befitting their scale," and added, "The role of large corporations is not to free-ride on the technology and know-how developed by existing small businesses, but to focus on developing vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostic kits that require massive capital and infrastructure."

Lee Cheol, Vice Chairman of the Korea Pest Control Association and Chair of the Countermeasures Committee, said, "It is not coexistence when large corporations, which should pioneer global markets, monopolize even small neighborhood markets," and urged, "We call on the Fair Trade Commission to investigate the tyranny and unfair competition of large corporations that reduce small business owners to subcontractors and to restore market order."

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