Gyeongju Mayor Ju Nak-young. [Provided by Gyeongju City]
Gyeongju Mayor Ju Nak-young. [Provided by Gyeongju City]

The success of an international event is not measured by the applause it receives in the moment. What truly determines success is what remains after the event ends — and how those outcomes shape the future of the city that hosted it.

That same challenge now faces Gyeongju, which successfully hosted the 2025 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

The question is whether the global attention the city attracted will be remembered as a one-time achievement, or whether it will become the starting point for sustained international cooperation. The World Gyeongju Forum is a vital opportunity to find that answer.

Gyeongju carries within it a millennium of Silla history — traces of different cultures meeting, exchanging ideas and giving rise to new civilizations. World Heritage sites including Bulguksa Temple, Seokguram Grotto and the Gyeongju Historic Areas speak to the city's extraordinary historical depth.

Just as the Silla Kingdom forged a distinctive culture through engagement with the outside world, Gyeongju today can draw on that same spirit of openness and integration to put forward the agenda questions the world must grapple with together.

The case for Gyeongju as a stage for international forums rests not on past glory alone, but on the enduring relevance of that history. The roots of Korean culture — what the world now marvels at as K-culture — run through this city.

Culture today has expanded far beyond the preservation of heritage and the enjoyment of the arts; it has become a core asset driving economies and industries.

The convergence of cultural content, tourism, technology and the creative industries generates new markets and jobs while sharpening a city's competitive edge.

In this era, Gyeongju — a city that possesses both a rich base of historical and cultural assets and genuine creative potential — holds special significance as a place to discuss the future of culture.

The World Gyeongju Forum should serve as an international arena for exploring the intersection of culture, the economy and industry, and for translating the city's historical assets into future value.

Particularly important is the task of carrying forward the spirit of the 2025 APEC Gyeongju Declaration through sustained international cooperation.

The achievements of the summit become a living legacy only when they move beyond the written record and develop into follow-on exchanges and concrete collaboration.

Building on the elevated international standing Gyeongju gained through APEC, the World Gyeongju Forum can become a platform where experts and policy officials from around the world meet regularly to discuss the future of culture and explore new possibilities for cooperation.

A forum's name alone, of course, does not confer international standing.

It requires consistently identifying agenda items that resonate globally, broadening networks of cooperation with domestic and international institutions, and translating the outcomes of discussion into concrete projects.

As those achievements accumulate, the World Gyeongju Forum can grow from a regional event into a forum that the international community returns to time and again.

If APEC brought the world to Gyeongju, the World Gyeongju Forum must now give the world a reason to come back.

Gyeongju must move beyond being a city that preserves an ancient civilization and become one that draws on the values of that civilization to lead conversations about the future of culture and industry — and to drive international cooperation.

The World Gyeongju Forum must not settle for being merely an international event held in Gyeongju. It must be a forum made possible by Gyeongju's history and identity — and all the more meaningful because it is Gyeongju.


kbj7653@heraldcorp.com