JEOLLABUK-DO < invest Korea

According to Yonhap News,          

The North Jeolla Province (Jeonbuk) will emerge as a center to cultivate the seeds of grains and flowers, utilizing radioactivity.

Jeonbuk has decided to implement the cultivation project for the seed industry released by the Ministry of Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MIFAFF) in 2009. With the implementation of the project, Jeonbuk will be cultivated as a radiation breeding hub.

The Seed Valley in Gimjae and the Radiation Breeding Research Center in Jeongeup will play a key role in making Jeonbuk the radiation breeding hub.

Radiation breeding is the screening technology to select excellent mutants by exposing plant seeds or seedlings to gamma radiation to induce mutation, which has widely been used in developing new breeds in advanced nations for a long time.

A total of 13.2 billion won will be invested to build the Radiation Breeding Research Center (RBRC) by 2013 in Jeongeup Cutting-Edge Radiation Research Institute of Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute.

If completed, the center is expected to make achievements such as selecting various mutants with radioactivity and shortening the breeding period.

The MIFAFF plans to invest about 27 billion won to attract 20 breeders to the Seed Valley by 2015 in order to build a research institute necessary for breeding.

"Based on the synergy effects the Seed Valley and RBRC can create together, we will enhance the competitiveness of the seed industry to develop it as a future growth engine," said a Jeonbuk official.

Source Text

Source: Yonhap News (Mar. 15, 2012)

** This is an English translation of a Korean news article.