[Harumanbo Harucheonja] Local Governments Launch 'Protect Residents' Health Through Walking' Challenge

Local governments are increasingly promoting residents' health through walking, the simplest and easiest physical activity. By encouraging walking through reward-based 'challenge' competitions, they aim to help residents manage their health by improving lifestyle habits as well as conditions such as obesity, depression, and hypertension.

Sejong City will hold the '1.5 Million Steps Walking Challenge' starting from the 11th of next month. Given the substantial number of steps, the challenge will run for nine months until November 11. Among those who achieve the goal, 50 people will be selected by lottery to receive the local currency 'Yeominjeon.' In addition to this, Sejong City offers various programs such as the '140,000 Steps in One Month' and '280,000 Steps in Two Months' challenges, and is considering introducing a '420,000 Steps in Three Months Challenge,' preparing diverse challenges so that citizens can participate according to their individual circumstances.

Another distinctive feature of these challenges is the use of mobile applications. A representative example is 'WalkOn,' a walking-based community healthcare platform operated by the startup Swalabi. Sejong City plans to use WalkOn to conduct its challenge, and Seoul’s Seongdong-gu will also run the 'Healthy Steps' challenge using WalkOn starting from the 29th. Those who achieve 150,000 steps during the period will be entered into a lottery to receive mobile gifticons. Challenges using such apps allow participants to freely take on challenges at their preferred time and place, with no restrictions on the number of participants, making it accessible to everyone. The National Movement Headquarters for 'One Day 10,000 Steps, One Day 1,000 Letters' (Hamanhacheon) also conducted the 'Hamanhacheon Walking Challenge' in September and November through the WalkOn app. Additionally, various challenges have been or will be held, such as Suncheon City in Jeollanam-do’s '2024 Year of the Blue Dragon First Step Walking,' Yeongam County’s 'Walking Around Yeongam,' and Seogwipo City in Jeju’s 'Tamna Walking.'

Some local governments have introduced challenges that reflect regional characteristics. Gurye-gun in Jeollanam-do recently held the 'Our Wheat Sprout Stomping Challenge' earlier this month through the health management app 'CashWalk,' operated by Nudge Healthcare. Gurye-gun accounts for 18% of domestic wheat production. Wheat farming involves farmers stomping on wheat sprouts every winter to help them grow well, which inspired this challenge. Participants who achieve 6,000 steps daily receive up to 10,000 cash points, and the first 50,000 people to accumulate 30,000 steps receive discount coupons for wheat gift sets.

Bucheon City in Gyeonggi Province combined the use of mobile apps with local walking trails. To commemorate the city’s 50th anniversary of its elevation to city status last year, Bucheon organized a challenge to complete one of six Bucheon Dulle-gil trail sections each month. The challenge was conducted by verifying actual walking using the GPS function built into smartphones and the WalkOn app. Bucheon City reported that a total of 4,938 people participated in the program, resulting in an average daily increase of 929 steps per person.

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