[New Year's Address] Chairman Kim Gi-moon "Promoting 4 Major Focus Tasks Including Establishment of Delivery Price Linkage System"

Kim Ki-moon, President of the Korea Federation of Small and Medium Business.

[Asia Economy Reporter Donghyun Choi] Kim Gi-moon, Chairman of the Korea Federation of SMEs, stated, "Next year, we will set four major policy directions, including the prompt establishment of the delivery price linkage system, and devote all our efforts to them."

In his 2023 New Year's address on the 29th, Chairman Kim said, "This year, the Korean economy is expected to remain at a growth rate in the 1% range," adding, "Amid the economic cold wave caused by expanding domestic and international uncertainties, there are growing concerns that the SME sector may lose its footing and direction."

Chairman Kim declared that to overcome the economic crisis and restore the dynamism of SMEs, he will actively pursue four major policy directions: ▲creating a policy environment centered on SMEs ▲early establishment of the delivery price linkage system ▲enhancing achievements in labor reform and regulatory innovation ▲completing the self-reliance foundation of SME cooperatives.

Chairman Kim said, "In the new year, interest rate hikes in response to global inflation are expected to continue, increasing the financial burden on SMEs," and added, "Just as the Korea Federation of SMEs proposed loan maturity extensions to the government to overcome the COVID-19 crisis, we will propose effective policies to enhance SMEs' ability to respond to the complex economic crisis."

He also promised, "The delivery price linkage system is scheduled for full implementation in the second half of next year," and "We will actively participate in the legislative process of subordinate laws to ensure the system operates effectively on the ground and reflect the opinions of SMEs in the field."

Chairman Kim pledged to achieve results in labor reform and regulatory innovation as well. He said, "SMEs face a reality where there is work but no workers, and workers want to work but are restricted by the 52-hour workweek," adding, "If the outdated labor policies maintained for 70 years continue, the vitality of the employment market will decline, and only exhausting conflicts between labor and management will increase." He continued, "The framework of employment and labor policies must be fundamentally changed by flexibilizing the 52-hour workweek and abolishing the foreign workforce quota," emphasizing, "We will closely monitor the government's progress on regulatory innovation to ensure that the regulatory improvement tasks proposed by the SME sector last year lead to actual institutionalization."

Chairman Kim also committed to completing the self-reliance foundation of SME cooperatives. He said, "Collaboration through cooperatives is an important means to enhance competitiveness for SMEs lacking funds and manpower, but joint sales, a core business, are defined as collusion, making it difficult to activate joint projects," and added, "We will strengthen the role of cooperatives in enhancing SME competitiveness by improving the system so that transactions between companies can be freed from the shackles of collusion."

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