[Column] A City with a Port Holds the Heart of Civilization... A New Route to Prosperity in the Arctic Shipping Era

Kim Youngbu, President of the Busan Institute of Science, Technology and Education Promotion

"A city with a port becomes the center of prosperity."

This brief statement is one of the simplest yet most powerful truths that runs through the history of human civilization. A port is not merely a logistics channel; it has been the heart and lifeblood of civilization's expansion. While land-based civilizations built fences on the ground, maritime civilizations expanded humanity's horizons by crossing boundaries through the sea. Cities that embraced the sea have always given birth to civilization and led prosperity.

In ancient times, the Phoenicians connected the Mediterranean by using the small port cities of Tyre and Sidon as their bases. Their strength lay not in military power, but in a port network built on trade, technology, and trust. Athens flourished as a democracy through the Port of Piraeus, and Rome established its maritime economic sphere, known as "Mare Nostrum" or "Our Sea," based on its ports.

In the Middle Ages, Venice became the crossroads of finance, trade, and culture, leading the order of European civilization. The Venetian merchant’s belief that "to lose the sea is to lose the nation" remains a valid proposition for civilization even today. In modern times, cities like Rotterdam and Singapore have proven the formula "port equals national competitiveness" in reality.

All these examples share one commonality: ports are the origin of civilization and the symbol of urban prosperity. Now, we are attempting to write the next chapter of this history in Busan.

Kim Taeyu, Professor Emeritus at Seoul National University, asserts in his book "The Last Chance for Korea" that "if Korea becomes a key port nation on the Arctic route, it will encounter a once-in-a-millennium opportunity for prosperity." At the center of this is Busan.

Busan Port has already grown to become the world’s second-largest transshipment port and is drawing attention as the gateway to the new Maritime Silk Road with the development of the Arctic route. However, it has not yet fully earned the title of "Global Hub Port City." A hub port is not simply a logistics transshipment site, but a city where technology, finance, industry, and culture converge-a space where people and ideas gather and grow.

From this perspective, the "Busan Global Hub City" strategy being pursued by Busan City can be seen as the vision that comes closest to the answer for the era of 21st-century maritime civilization.

Since taking office, Busan Mayor Park Hyungjun has consistently emphasized the vision of a "Tri-Port city" that combines port, airport, and inland logistics.

He states, "Once logistics innovation is achieved with Gadeok New Airport as the axis, Busan will leap beyond being a simple transshipment port to become the center of a global value chain capable of remanufacturing and reproduction." The capital flowing in will elevate Busan to a financial hub in Northeast Asia, and if industry, tourism, and culture are integrated into a complex city, Busan will lead the era of the Arctic route and redraw the map of global maritime civilization.

In the 21st century, urban competitiveness is determined not by military power, but by data, technology, and an ecosystem of innovation.

Busan now stands at that turning point. Future-oriented infrastructure such as smart port demonstrations, marine mobility testbeds, and clean hydrogen ports are being rapidly established. The Busan Institute of Science, Technology and Education Promotion (BISTEP), Busan Technopark, local universities, and research institutes are expanding the industry-academia-research convergence ecosystem, driving the transformation into a technology-based maritime civilization city.

If Venice in the past reshaped European civilization through finance and trade, Busan is rewriting the maritime order of Northeast Asia through technology and innovation. This is not simply an industrial policy but a 21st-century maritime civilization strategy led by Busan.

The vision of the "Busan Global Hub City" is not just for Busan’s prosperity. It is about establishing a new model for balanced national development in which the entire southeastern and southern regions grow together.

The Busan-Ulsan-Gyeongnam (BUKG) megacity, with a population of 8 million, can build a southern economic circulation belt centered on shipbuilding, machinery, energy, and digital industries, promoting region-led innovative growth. This is the path to evolving beyond the Seoul metropolitan area-centered system into a dual-axis national growth model, and it is also the core of the government’s "Four Axes, Three Special Zones" system. Ultimately, the Busan megalopolis is not just a city’s strategy but a testing ground for Korea’s future civilization transformation.

In the 21st century, human civilization is once again turning toward the sea. The sea is a reservoir of new energy, a pathway for data, and the stage for solving humanity’s ecological, climate, and food challenges. At the center of this stands Busan.

Busan is a city where industry and port, science and talent, and the lives of its citizens pulse together as the heart of civilization. That heart beats powerfully above the Arctic route, in the laboratories of research institutes, and in the daily lives of its citizens.

A city with a port creates the future, and a city with civilization leads humanity. And now, the heart of that future is beating in the Busan megalopolis.

Youngbu Kim, Director of BISTEP.

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