KFS to offer diverse supporting policies to encourage overseas plantation





Regardless of global economic depression, the development venture for overseas forest resources is emerging as the new investment outlet for overseas plantation investment by domestic corporations which has increased steadily.





According to the "Extent of Overseas Plantation Investment by Domestic Corporation in 2009" represented by Korea Forest Service (Minister Chung Kwang-soo), it shows that 12 domestic corporations have implemented plantation over nearly 28,000 ha in 7 countries.





Since the Republic of Korea has started the overseas plantation in 1993, it has increased 13% as it reached 207,000 ha in 2009, and the recent annual average of 12,000 ha/year is more than twice of that in the earlier years.





Extent of Overseas Plantation Investment by Domestic Corporation in 2009

Total (ha)	Solomon Is.	Vietnam			Indonesia					China	Laos	Uruguay	Chile
	Eagon	Seyang Cosmo	Han wha	Taerim	Korindo	Samtan	Daesang Holdings	LG Corp.	NFCF	Dong sung	Kim	POSCO	Eagon
27,796	860	675	168	300	16,258	627	2,000	4,100	556	1,500	460	92	200

The analysis report on overseas plantation of 2009 shows that the investment in bioenergy plantation has increased consistently since 2008 reaching 20,000ha after 400,000ha of candidate sites for bioenergy plantation were procured by government-to-government initiatives with Indonesia and Cambodia to find an alternative energy resource in accordance with global warming and exhaustion of fossil materials. (Investors: Daesang Holdings, LG Corp.)





In addition, the investment regions of overseas plantation used to be concentrated in Southeast Asia like Indonesia and Vietnam, but recently expanded to Uruguay and Chile. Especially, POSCO, energy glutton enterprise, has implemented the A/R CDM in coping with UNFCCC as of the very first Korean corporation.
(*KFS to produce carbon credits for 6.18 million tCO2 for next 30 years by the A/R CDM over 20,000 ha.)





And aside from this, the investment plan report for overseas forest resource development submitted to Korea Forest Service has largely increased from less than five cases per year up to 22 cases in 2009.





The type of investment has transformed and expanded from afforestation sector in the past to processing and harvesting sector. In particular, afforestation for producing and investing on wood pellet which emerges as the resource of renewable energy have been increasing gradually. Besides, the overseas afforestation investment is expected to keep increasing since the area with final permit for forest investment reached 130,000ha in target countries.





Mr. Chong-ho Park, Director of International Cooperation Division in Korea Forest Service, mentioned that the reason for overseas plantation investment by domestic corporation is based on securing the alternative energy in case of global raw material uprising and UNFCCC. Furthermore, he added that it is also a result reflected by various practical anticipations such as, the prospect of afforestation investment, the necessity of stabilized supply of raw materials, securing bioenergy source and carbon credit along with the enhancement of the corporation image.





The Korea Forest Service has strengthened the support of various policies to encourage overseas plantation, including the financial support for purchasing candidate site and plantation when invested in the country where the land ownership by foreigner is admitted such as countries in South America starting this year.





Moreover, the Korea Forest Service has constantly carried out the investment consulting aiming to reinforce the competitiveness of investment enterprise by strengthening cooperation with partner countries as well as hosting investment seminars and symposium. It is also planning to establish the overseas forest investment infrastructure of domestic corporation by promoting the forest resource diplomacy continuously to make a strong cooperative bond with the countries which have rich tropical forest resources like Central and South America and Africa, in order to diversify the overseas plantation investment concentrated in Southeast Asia.





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