Wanju County Council Member Yoon Subong: "Healing Agriculture Needed to Revitalize Healing Tourism Suitable for Post-Corona"

Published 14 Feb.2022 15:25(KST)

[Wanju=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Han-ho] On the 14th, Yoon Soo-bong, a member of the Wanju County Council, argued in a 5-minute speech at the 2nd plenary session of the 265th extraordinary meeting that “a foundation for revitalizing healing tourism suitable for the post-COVID-19 era should be established through healing agriculture.”

Councilor Yoon stated, “According to Statistics Korea data at the end of last year, 22.3% of adults aged 19 and over felt ‘lonely,’ an increase of 1.8% from the previous year, and the number of depression patients increased by 4.1% in 2020 compared to 2019 before COVID-19,” adding, “Recently, healing agriculture has emerged as a way to alleviate such depression and everyday isolation.”

He continued, “In Korea, the Rural Development Administration began research on the healing effects of horticultural crops such as flowers and vegetables in 1994, established the concept of ‘healing agriculture’ in 2013, and since 2017 has introduced pilot projects to foster healing agriculture services, proving their effectiveness.”

In particular, Councilor Yoon pointed out, “Wanju County also enacted the ‘Ordinance on the Promotion and Support of Healing Agriculture in Wanju County’ in September last year, and from January this year, secured a budget for healing agriculture-related projects and is now in the full-scale implementation stage,” adding, “This year is an important time to establish a 5-year plan for fostering healing agriculture in Wanju County, so it is necessary to review Wanju County’s conditions and advanced countries’ cases to prepare policies unique to Wanju County.”