Invest KOREA

Held a briefing session on the designation of circular resources and a roundtable on the Serious Accidents Punishment Act for foreign-invested companies

The Foreign Investment Ombudsman of KOTRA held a briefing session on the notification on the designation of circular resources and a roundtable on the Serious Accidents Punishment Act for foreign-invested companies on June 28 and July 4, respectively. It was designed to provide information on Korea's major policies and systems to foreign-invested companies and to listen to the difficulties they experienced when doing business here.

More than 40 people, including officials from foreign-invested companies, participated in a "briefing session on the notification on the designation of circular resources" held at Yonsei Severance Building in Jung-gu, Seoul on June 28. The Korea Environment Corporation introduced standards for circular resources recognition, the procedures for technology review, and application process, etc. Also, it presented specific examples of circular resources to help participating companies understand what products are recognized as circular resources and accurately recognize the qualification requirements including expedited processing and regulation exemptions.

Meanwhile, the Act on Promotion of Transition to Circular Economy and Society that has been in effect since this year, stipulates to make contribution to realizing a sustainable circular economy and society by promoting the circular use of the generated wastes. Compared to the previous Framework Act on Resources Circulation that focused on suppressing and handling the generated waste, this Act aims to promote the transition to circular economy in the entire process of production, distribution, consumption.

On July 4, the roundtable on the Serious Accidents Punishment Act was held at Invest KOREA Plaza in Yeomgok-dong, Seoul to help officials of foreign chambers of commerce and foreign-invested companies in Korea understand the purpose and system of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act. The roundtable was attended by more than 20 participants including those from foreign chambers of commerce and foreign-invested companies in Korea, including the US, Japan and China. YOON & YANG, a law firm, gave a lecture on the trends in the legal cases and the legal system of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act.

The Serious Accidents Punishment Act was came into force in 2022 to promote safety management at industrial sites and to raise safety awareness of business managers. As foreign-invested companies in Korea have complained of difficulties in refine their internal systems to comply with the Act, since the enactment of this Act, this roundtable is expected to address their concerns. Kim Sung-jin, KOTRA's foreign investment ombudsman, emphasized that "it is very important to prevent hardships and difficulties experienced by foreign-invested companies in the field," and added, "we will continue to cooperate with related ministries and agencies to step up our efforts to prevent foreign-invested companies from experiencing such difficulties."



Source : Invest KOREA (2024.07.05.)