Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and Korea Tourism Organization Hold 2023 Excellent Regional Tourism Promotion Organization (DMO) Awards Ceremony

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Tourism Organization announced on the 20th that they will hold the ‘2023 Excellent Regional Tourism Promotion Organization (hereinafter DMO) Awards and Performance Workshop’ at the Jeongdong 1928 Art Center in Seoul.

Korea Tourism Organization. [Photo by Korea Tourism Organization]

DMOs are organizations formed by residents, industries, and local governments to unite and lead regional tourism capabilities proactively. Since 2019, the Korea Tourism Organization has discovered 40 DMOs and has been implementing support projects such as expert consulting to improve regional self-reliance, benchmarking excellent cases, and joint promotional marketing.

The event will be attended by about 70 people, including DMOs selected from 2023 to this year, local government and industry officials, and plans to award DMOs that achieved outstanding results last year and share excellent cases.

Among the 21 DMOs selected last year, the Korea Tourism Organization President’s Award will be given to 2 top performers and 5 excellent performers. The top DMOs selected are ▲Donghae Cultural Tourism Foundation (Donghae-si, Gangwon) ▲Happy Travel Sharing Co., Ltd. (Hongseong-gun, Chungnam). The excellent DMOs include ▲Miryang Cultural Tourism Foundation (Miryang-si, Gyeongnam) ▲Hadong Resident Fair Travel Nolruwa Cooperative (Hadong-gun, Gyeongnam) ▲Wanju Cultural Foundation (Wanju-gun, Jeonbuk) ▲Jeonju Tourism Marketing Co., Ltd. (Jeonju-si, Jeonbuk) ▲Busan Tourism Organization (Busan Metropolitan City).

At the performance workshop, the Donghae Cultural Tourism Foundation will introduce the night market project ‘Mangsang Moonlight Sand Market,’ which highlights regional characteristics. In addition, DMOs from Hongseong-gun and Jeonju-si will present achievements in identifying and solving local issues such as accommodation problems and overtourism. Furthermore, a networking program between senior and junior DMOs will be held to exchange experiences and know-how through communication among participants.

Lee Sang-min, Director of the National Tourism Office at the Korea Tourism Organization, said, “The importance of local tourism that can attract related populations and, further, living populations is increasing as a solution to the problem of regional population decline. This event was prepared to share the business achievements of excellent DMOs last year and to seek a better future, so I hope it will be an opportunity to consider the role of DMOs together and take a step forward.”

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