Changwon Special City Enhances Future Preparedness and Administrative Efficiency Through Organizational Restructuring

Establishment of the 'Future Strategic Industries Bureau' for Future Preparedness in Nuclear Power, Defense, Aerospace, and Medical Bio
Strengthening Administrative Responsiveness to Youth Employment, Investment Attraction, Local Companies, and Carbon

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Song Jong-gu] Changwon Special City in Gyeongnam is promoting an organizational restructuring to secure execution capability for the core tasks of the 8th elected administration and to respond to the changed era environment and administrative demands led by the 4th Industrial Revolution.

This organizational restructuring focuses on strategically responding to the new government policy direction such as digital transformation, advancement of the 4th industry, revitalization of private investment, and job creation through corporate growth, considering external environmental changes like the 4th Industrial Revolution and climate change, internal conditions such as the growth limits of the Changwon National Industrial Complex centered on manufacturing and large corporations, youth population outflow, and regional industrial crises, Changwon City explained.

The restructuring includes the establishment of a new ‘Future Strategic Industry Bureau’ to prepare for the future in areas such as nuclear power, defense, aerospace, and medical bio, strengthening organizational functions for future readiness in the era of the 4th Industrial Revolution.

The Future Strategy Division will have teams for future industrial policy, digital transformation, and research and development cooperation to perform comprehensive future strategy policy and R&D cooperation roles. The Strategic Industry Division will focus on strategic industries such as materials, parts, and equipment (SoBuJang), defense and aerospace, nuclear power, and hydrogen. The Future New Industry Division will concentrate on future growth industries such as mobility, medical bio, robotics, and technology startups.

In particular, to foster the medical bio industry including digital health, anti-aging, and advanced bio, a dedicated medical bio industry team will be established. By strengthening the roles of digital transformation and R&D cooperation, the plan is to transform companies within the industrial complex into smart factories, creating a virtuous industrial ecosystem that leads to groundbreaking productivity improvement, sales increase, and job creation.

The Population and Youth Officer directly under the mayor will be reorganized into the Youth Policy Officer to establish a one-stop support system for youth policies, support, jobs, and startups. The Investment Attraction Team will be reorganized by establishing an Investment Location Team and a Residential Support Team to create a process-oriented organization from the stage of providing investment sites to investment and post-management, maximizing the efficiency of the investment attraction system.

Under the 2nd Deputy Mayor, the Environment and City Bureau will strengthen environmental policy and climate change response functions. Meanwhile, under the 1st Deputy Mayor, the Future Strategic Industry Bureau will establish a dedicated nuclear power industry organization to support local nuclear power companies affected by the nuclear phase-out policy, striving to restore and foster the regional nuclear power industry ecosystem.

A Safety General Division will be newly established under the Safety, Transportation, and Construction Bureau to meet the increased citizen safety demands after COVID-19 and to strengthen the response system for various disasters including major accident prevention, social disasters, and natural disasters.

Also, the Marine Policy Division under the Marine, Port, and Fisheries Bureau will be renamed the Marine Leisure Division to build infrastructure for safe leisure activities in the post-COVID era, such as creating waterfronts linked to coastal areas.

Along with the reorganization of the duties under the 1st and 2nd Deputy Mayors and the restructuring of offices and bureaus, functions will be separated, consolidated, or unified at the department level to strengthen job connectivity and promote checks and balances and efficiency between departments.

The 1st Deputy Mayor is responsible for securing intangible and software growth engines. To this end, the organizational structure of the industry and economy-related bureaus under his jurisdiction will be elevated, focusing on fostering future growth industries. The 1st Deputy Mayor oversees the Planning and Coordination Office, Future Strategic Industry Bureau (currently Smart Innovation Industry Bureau), Economic and Job Bureau, Welfare, Women and Health Bureau, and Autonomous Administration Bureau.

The 2nd Deputy Mayor focuses on securing tangible and hardware growth engines. Accordingly, the Environment and City Bureau will be placed at the highest level to lead urban restructuring where urban planning, construction, roads, transportation, and marine sectors are organically connected. The 2nd Deputy Mayor oversees the Environment and City Bureau, Culture, Tourism and Sports Bureau (currently Culture, Sports and Tourism Bureau), Safety, Transportation and Construction Bureau (currently Safety, Construction and Transportation Bureau), and Marine, Port and Fisheries Bureau.

Additionally, the title of each ‘Officer’ within departments will be changed to ‘Team,’ and the title of ‘Officer Manager’ will be changed to ‘Team Leader’ to resolve external title confusion.

Hong Nam-pyo, Mayor of Changwon Special City, said, “The 4th Industrial Revolution is rapidly changing all era environments including industry, economy, and culture. The organization must also continuously innovate to adapt to the changed environment.” He added, “With this restructuring, we will become a more proactive and systematized organization and do our best to make Changwon a Northeast Asia central city through change and innovation based on the 4th Industrial and Science and Technology.”

This organizational restructuring plan was made without increasing the size of the organization or personnel in line with the new government’s freeze on organization and personnel. It was achieved through functional adjustments and reorganization between departments. Public opinions will be gathered through legislative notice in August, submitted to the city council in September, and after deliberation and resolution by the Changwon Special City Council regular session, it is scheduled to be implemented in October.

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