Koo Yun-cheol vows swift push to build regional AI infrastructure

400 billion-won advanced center targets completion next year

Agricultural disaster rate to be cut 25% by 2030

[Yonhap]
[Yonhap]

The government will exempt a 400 billion-won (about $262 million) advanced data center project in Jangseong-gun, South Jeolla Province, from the local fiscal investment review process to accelerate its development. A comprehensive safety management plan for the agriculture and forestry sector was also announced.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Koo Yun-cheol said Friday at a joint emergency economic headquarters and economic ministers' meeting that the government would build a large-scale advanced data center in Jangseong-gun, South Jeolla Province, as the seventh project under the Regional Revitalization Investment Fund, laying the core AI infrastructure for regional industry. "We will push forward the relevant procedures swiftly so the project proceeds without delay," he said.

The Regional Revitalization Investment Fund uses a government-seeded mother fund to attract private investment for regional projects. To fast-track the seventh project — the Jangseong advanced data center — the government decided to apply an exemption from the local fiscal investment review.

South Jeolla Province and Jangseong-gun must contribute capital to the special purpose company (SPC) established to carry out the project; that process is expected to be shortened by up to nine to ten months. Under the exemption track, the economic ministers' meeting approves the measure, a specialist agency completes its review, and the Ministry of Interior and Safety then grants the consultation exemption.

The project, with a total budget of 395.9 billion won, will build a large data center in the Gwangju Research and Development Special Zone in Jangseong-gun, South Jeolla Province. Selected as a Regional Revitalization Investment Fund target last year, it broke ground in February, with completion targeted for December next year and operations set to begin in March 2028.

The government expects the project to generate roughly 800 billion won in production-inducing effects and create jobs for around 3,000 people. It also anticipates broader benefits from dispersing data centers — currently concentrated in the greater Seoul area — to the regions, laying a foundation for the AI transformation of local industries and the attraction of advanced companies.

On the comprehensive agricultural and forestry safety management plan, Koo pledged to cut the agricultural safety disaster rate 25 percent from 2024 levels by 2030. The government will make human-detection sensors on shredding machines mandatory and expand the installation of operator protective structures on forklifts and excavators. Seat-belt warning devices will be required on ride-on farm machinery such as tractors, and the government plans to expand distribution of accident-detection terminals that automatically alert emergency services when a rollover or overturn occurs.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, the agricultural disaster rate stands at 5.0 percent — about 7.5 times the overall industrial disaster rate of 0.67 percent — while the fatality rate is roughly three times the all-industry average. Last year, 297 farmers died in work-related incidents. The government also plans to raise the coverage level of farmers' safety insurance to match that of industrial accident insurance and to pursue legislation tentatively titled the Agricultural Work Safety and Disaster Prevention Act.


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