Lessons from the Republic of Korea

While the Republic of Korea has experienced continuous rapid growth since its economic development started in the 1960s, its natural environment continues to deteriorate. Korea’s biodiversity has been being rapidly declining due to accelerated urbanization, industrialization, and pollution. Such reduction in biological diversity represents not only the loss of natural resources, but also the erosion of inhabitable land. It is therefore essential for Korea’s future as well as that of humankind to curb reckless development that results in the mass destruction of biological resources and diversity. Fortunately, as a result of the continued implementation of conservation policies since the early 1990s, the natural environment has been improving noticeably these days.

As a reponsible member of the global village, the Republic of Korea has been actively participating in various international conservation programs. In this vein, the Republic of Korea acceded to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in October 1994 for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity. In accordance with the provisions of the Convention, the Korean government formulated a long-term National Biodiversity Strategy (NBS) to ensure the systematic management of Korea’s biological diversity.

The Law of Natural Environment Conservation, which is administered by the MOE, is Korea's basic law for biodiversity and nature protection. It defines categories of protected areas and provides for species and habitat protection. The Law serves as a common framework for nature conservation and strengthens the provisions of other nature laws administered by government agencies. Several government agencies share the responsibility of conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, in accordance with various laws as follows.

Ministry	Laws	Major contents
Ministry of Environment	Law of Natural Environment Conservation	Conservarion general, special species protection
	Law of Wildlife Protection and Hunting	Protection wild mammals and birds
	Law of Wetland Conservation	Wetland protection
	Law of Natural Parks	National parks, country parks
	Law of Ecosystem Conservation for Uninhabited Islands	Island ecosystem protection
Ministry of Agriculture and Forests	Law of Plants Protection	Plant quarantine
Ministry of Agriculture and Forests	Law of Seed Business	Seed management, protection of valuable genetic resources
Forestry Administration	Law of Forests	Forest management
Ministry of Construction and Transpotation	Law of National Land Use Management	Land use planning
Ministry of Construction and Transpotation	Law of Urban Parks	Urban parks management
Cultural Properties Administration	Law of Cultural Properties Protection	Protection of natural monument
Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries	Law of Fisheries	Fisheries management
Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries	Law of Inland Water Protection	Inland fisheries management

The Korean government drafted NBS in 1996 and finalized it in 1997. The NBS was submitted to CBD in January 1998 after getting approval from the National Cabinet Council, which is the highest government council to make public policy. The MOE played a key role in drafting the NBS because the MOE is the main ministry working to conserve biodiversity and implement the CBD nationally. Many other ministries related to conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity have also actively participated in developing the NBS. The formulation of Korea’s NBS involved numerous public hearings and review meetings organized by the National Biodiversity Committee, whose members were drawn from related government Ministries (13), research institutions (13), non-governmental organizations (10), and related experts (5). The National Biodiversity Committee had a working group to develop the NBS effectively. The working group consisted of 9 sub-working groups including the coordinating group, biodiversity conservation group, agriculture group, forest group, fisheries group, tourism group, genetic resources and biotech group, public awareness group and institutional group.

The NBS reflects the Republic of Korea’s strong commitment to the objectives of the CBD, and is part of the Korean government’s ongoing effort to implement policies that ensure the conservation and sustainable use of Korea’s biological assets.

The NBS is divided into five 5 chapters including an introduction (chapter 1). Chapter 2 briefly describes the overview of biodiversity in Korea and chapter 3 deals with Korea’s strategy for biodiversity conservation. Chapter 4 describes the sustainable use of biodiversity including agriculture and biotechnology. Finally, chapter 5 covers the capacity building for biodiversity management, including research and education

The Republic of Korea’s NBS is a long-term national strategy, not an action plan. The NBS therefore does not address how it would be implemented, including institutional responsibilities or budgeting. The Korean government will develop an action plan to implement the NBS this year.

The weakness of the NBS is that it has not gone through any planning or implementation cycle. Another problem comes from the development process of the NBS. There was no consultation process with local governments or the business sector when it was developed. That is why the NBS has not been implemented systematically at the local level even though local governments have their own conservation plans. The NBS was initially drafted by the MOE and reviewed by the National Biodiversity Committee, and followed by consultation with related ministries and public hearings. The consultation with related ministries was carried out via circulated documents. The development process of the NBS is as follows.

There was no financial assistance from any international organizations for the development and implementation of the NBS. The MOE used its staff to develop the NBS because there was no government budget for the project. However, the members of the National Biodiversity Committee and the Working Group actively participated voluntarily in the process to develop the NBS.

The NBS considered addressing biodiversity as a crosscutting theme across different sectors, including agriculture, forestry, fisheries, tourism, and so on. As mentioned before, the working group to develop the NBS had 9 sub-groups to cover all different sectors. The members of the sub-groups were from the ministries and institutions related to agriculture, forestry, fishries, tourism, and so on. The NBS mainly expressed the sustainable use of the different government sectors, such as sustainable agriculture, sustainable forestry and sustainable use of genetic resources.

Even though the NBS was approved by the National Cabinet Council and signed by the President, it has not been fully supported by economic and development policy. There are a lot of strategic plans in all different government sectors including economic, construction and development. The NBS has been considered as one of them. Furthermore, most of the other strategic plans were established before the NBS was developed.

Since acceding to the Convention on Biological Diversity in October 1994, Korea has been not only actively joining international efforts that serve to further the objectives of the Convention, but also amending the related provisions for biodiversity conservation and sustainable use. To maintain the natural balance of our ecosystems and to prevent fauna and flora from becoming extinct, the MOE has designated 43 species as endangered wild fauna and flora and 151 species as protected wild fauna and flora under the Law of Natural Environment Conservation. The hunting and capture of these species is strictly prohibited.

In addition to the basic surveys on nature, other surveys are conducted to help determine domestic biological diversity. For example, the overall condition of forests and mountains across the country is surveyed every ten years, and surveys on wild animal habitats are carried out every year. Since 1994, surveys on the biological diversity of forest ecosystems have been conducted to foster the conservation and sustainable use of forests and their plants and animals. Further, usage of forests should complement the social, economic, and cultural values of the community at large.

For the in-situ conservation of biological diversity, the Korean government has designated and tried to enlarge protected areas: Natural Parks, Ecosystem Conservation Areas, Wetland Conservation Areas, Birds Protection Areas, and Natural Forest Protection Areas. However, as the Ministry of Construction and Transportation administers the Law of National Land Use Management, the framework law on land use, it does not have the intent of conserving biodiversity.

Ex-situ conservation of living resources refers to the conservation of living resources in man-made environments with a view to overcoming the limitations of in-situ conservation. With the rapid advancement of biotechnology in recent years, the ex-situ conservation of living and genetic resources has increased in importance. Ex-situ conservation facilities include species and genetic banks, facilities for plant tissue in test tubes and microorganism cultures, zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens, and microorganism resource centers. At present, there are 13 zoos, 9 botanical gardens, and 7 tree gardens in Korea. To enable biodiversity inventory, assessment, research, monitoring and the Clearing House Mechanism establishment of the National Natural History Museum is in the planning stage under MOE

However, the above policy has not been fully based on the NBS. The NBS and national biodiversity policy are not closely linked. In fact, many people, including the staff of the MOE, do not know much about the content of the NBS.

Korea has so far not developed any systems, procedures or indicators to monitor the implementation process of the NBS. Recently, the MOE held the 1st official meeting of the National Biodiversity Council, which has been based on the Law of Natural Environment Conservation since August 1997, to check the implementation status of the NBS. The MOE will develop guidelines to monitor the implementation of the NBS and assess its status annually.

The NBS should be supported politically and financially by all branches of government, and coincide with national economic and development plans. The NBS alone is not effective enough. The NBS should be followed by an action plan to implement it systematically, along with a monitoring system to monitor its status.

The Ministry of Environment, the Republic of Korea, 1997, National Biodiversity Strategy.