Global City Incheon Proud to Hold the 66th Session of the UN ESCAP
Global City Incheon Proud to Hold the 66th Session of the UN ESCAP
  • Daniel Ko
  • 승인 2010.05.10 14:28
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In the run-up to the 66th session of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Kwak Ha-hyeong, Director General of International Relations Department, Incheon Metropolitan City, had an interview with Korea IT Times to introduce roles played by Incheon city and plans to be a worldwide green growth city.

Kwak Ha-hyeong, Director General of International Relations Department, Incheon Metropolitan City

Q: The 66th Commission Session of the UN ESCAP (CS66) will be held in Songdo, Incheon and will provide a good opportunity to publicize Incheon. Do you have any specific plans to promote public marketing

A: First, at this CS66, 62 member countries and their government representatives, major international UN organizations representatives, and non-government organization representatives will be in attendance. When we introduce the city of Incheon, I expect it to have a strong and effective result. Once the attendees arrive in Incheon, we will provide an Incheon tour and a night tour to display major tourist attractions available in Songdo and to show Incheon's progressing development.

The Commission session will adopt "Incheon Declaration" and announce APCICT an official institute, which is at present being provisionally operated. ESCAP also wants to show the development of Incheon. We want to hear the news of Songdo, Incheon becoming the best UN organization. We are positioning ourselves to fulfill this, and we realize this is a good opportunity. By doing this, we want to propel an attraction from the UN and international organizations for creation of jobs and to improve our name as a cosmopolitan city.

Q: After establishment of the APCICT, Incheon will emerge as a UN city. Can you explain the environmental and geographical merits of this

A: Over 1 million people are able to arrive in Incheon within 3 hours in an airplane and 60 cities are located nearby. Incheon has one of the best distribution infrastructures in Incheon Airport and Port of Incheon. Incheon bridge maximizes Incheon's geographical advantage with good accessibility. Also, there is a strong workforce and easy conditions to construct a Northeast Asia hub position.

Central Park

In 2009, after the first stage of the enterprise was finished, Incheon Economic Zone was ranked 5th in the world and became a Korean landmark along with Incheon Bridge and the Incheon's subway that extends to Songdo. Songdo's cosmopolitan city's central landmark includes Songdo Convensia, Tomorrow City, Trade Tower, and main anchor facilities that are completed one after another to prepare the material foundation for city development. Stage 2 enterprises are being propelled, by turning Incheon into a global city and attracting global enterprises for business and distribution. IT, BT, education, sightseeing, and culture hubs are being constructed with detailed strategies and a strong workforce where visitors can gather and see a developing city. They are also concentrating on bringing in cutting edge information and communications infrastructure into Incheon. By using Incheon's geographical advantages, they are trying to build a foundation in Incheon to benefit Northeast Asia and promote Incheon as a UN central city. ESCAP affiliated APCICT, a UN Depository Library, the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UN/ISDR) Northeast Asia Office, the UN/ISDR Global Education and Training Institute and the ESCAP Subregional Office for East and North-East Asia all will take a spot in Incheon Songdo. There is a mutual cooperation and a synergy effect between these organizations and we are anticipating and looking forward to more UN organizations moving in.

 

Q: Explain Incheon Songdo's plans to have a model city infrastructure and to become a green development city and the competition it will face worldwide.

A: We want to make Incheon a place where people want to live. Our goal is to make the best established conditions and to make it a green city. We are propelling that goal with the Compact Smart Green Grid City.

Compact city includes residence, business, leisure, education, medical treatment, shopping, convention and facilities needed in your lifestyle that are only 30-40 minutes away. Smart city includes being able to freely connect to the ubiquitous network. Green grid city includes facilities that will all be environment friendly.

In Songdo, there are no ground power poles and steel towers and no trash cans. You throw your trash away at home or inside a building and when you throw it away, it travels through a pipe underground and it is handled from there. Also, we will be the world's first open recycling city(automatic underground trash gathering facility and wastewater utilizing facility).

Incheon is aggressively practicing conserving changeover energy. Songdo cosmopolitan city tasks are exemplary for a green city and will gain world-famous prestige and will receive the LEED-ND(a system for rating and certifying green neighborhoods).

Incheon's development direction is getting a lot of interest from many scholars. Last year at the 2009 Asia Pacific Cities Summit, Jacques Attali Ph.D, a world famous scholar, stated that Incheon is "the future's leader city and Asia's port city and everyone in the world is closely watching the Incheon Songdo project." Also at the World Environment Forum, Ban Ki-moon, U.N. Secretary-General, stated during his keynote speech, "Incheon is the gateway to the future." He also pointed out that Incheon is the symbol of a 21st century future city.


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