Selected as a Rural Care Village Project Recipient: Hongseong-gun, Chungnam

Providing Integrated Care Services to Rural Residents and Others

The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs announced on the 6th that Hongseong-gun, Chungcheongnam-do, has been selected as the target area for the 2023 Rural Care Village Creation Project.

A rural care village is a space that provides integrated care services to socially vulnerable groups such as rural residents, the elderly, and people with disabilities by installing care facilities including social farms, welfare facilities, and community exchange centers. Starting with the selection of two sites in 2022, a total of three sites have been selected and are currently being developed as of 2023.

Since January, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has conducted a selection contest for local governments for the rural care village creation project. After document screening and presentation evaluation, Hongseong-gun, Chungnam, was finally selected. Hongseong-gun, chosen as a rural care village, is planned to receive 18.2 billion KRW (9.1 billion KRW in national funds) over three years.

To create the care village, Hongseong-gun proposed plans to establish a care hub space combined with a 'social farm' that provides various services such as care, education, and employment to vulnerable groups through agricultural activities centered on residents' living areas, as well as to create welfare, education, and cultural service spaces utilizing closed schools. In particular, it received high evaluations for the care village creation and operation led by social agriculture practice organizations such as the Janggok-myeon Residents' Autonomy Association and the Cooperative Happy Farm.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs plans to establish a close cooperative system with the selected local government to smoothly proceed with procedures such as establishing basic plans and detailed designs for the creation of rural care villages. To provide the lacking social services in rural areas, the ministry plans to foster various types of social service provision models, including social farms, regional service communities, and care village creation.

Choi Bong-soon, Director of the Rural Social Services Division at the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, said, "Through the care village creation project, we will create rural villages where local residents and socially vulnerable groups live together in everyday rural life and become self-reliant."

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