Gov"t to invest 45 trillion Won in Agriculture

The government and ruling coalition decided to pour 45 trillion won into its agricultural investment and loan project from this year to 2004 to improve the competitiveness of Korea's agricultural sector.
In a joint meeting held on February 22, they also decided to provide 700 billion won in loans to rural households suffering from high financial expences. A 100-billion-won fund will be implemented to help the individual farmers who have each amassed over-500 million won in public debt.
Meanwhile, beginning this year, the agricultural authority is planning to focus software-oriented investments for the transportation, environmental and information areas as part of the first year of the second stage of the agricultural investment and loan project.
The change of policy reflects the self-criticism by the government and realization that there were quite a lot inefficiencies in investing sources like facilties and tools during the first stage of the project, from 1992 to 1998.