SEOUL, KOREA - Korea Saemaul Undong Center has launched the “second Saemaul Undong,"a movement seeking community development and modernization to enhance the quality of the living in the 21st century, Shim Yoon-jong, president of the center said.
Noting that the first Saemaul Undong started in the 1970s and was designed to overcome absolute poverty and improve living standards, Shim said, "Now, however, Korea has become a quasi-advanced country boasting a ranking of 15th in the world with per capita GDP of over $20,000. To let the nation enter into ranks of truly advanced countries, we should stage the second Saemaul Undong in earnest."
He said that the second Saemaul Undong will be launched in two directions - a nationwide campaign to enhance national spirit through sharing, service, and consideration domestically, as well as a worldwide campaign to hand down the successes of Korea's Saemaul Undong to developing countries.
4 major tasks of Saemaul Undong
The cultural community movement refers to a campaign to recover community spirit, which focuses on spreading civic consciousness carrying out the spirit of sharing, service, and consideration while placing the top priority on the group rather than the individual.
"In line with this, we will reform our training center into a citizens’educational center to instill advanced citizens' consciousness into the people's mind. We will build a cyber Saemaul educational system, hold open lectures for citizens, and operate a circuit educational corps," he said.
"To help make reading a way of life, the center will expand culture, arts talent service corps to hold regular performances in some agricultural and fishery villages that are alienated from cultural activities. It will also stage regional cultural activities in 1,771 regions across the country which have small Saemaul libraries," said Shim.
Along with this, the center is staging a campaign to produce a healthy society through the Health Korea campaign to create sound society climate by spreading health activities and the Apartment Community campaign through activation of affinity groups such as chorus and service.
"As part of the neighbor community movement, the center will exert efforts to spread sharing culture through the nationwide 1% Sharing Campaign of income, talents, and volunteer work as well as the exchange campaign between cities and rural areas through green tourism, direct trade of agricultural and fishery goods, and the cultivation of fallow ground," he said.
It is also staging the Care Campaign for the elderly and children in low-income brackets through a tailor service for single senior citizens, hairdressing, sign language, and after-school learning guidance services, while establishing the 1:1 sisterhood relationship with multicultural families.
At the same time, the center is engaging in a life safety cultural campaign with the help of the Crime Prevention Service Corps and a school zone keeper activity.
Economic community movement
"To build up a healthy economic community, the center will stage the Smart Agricultural Village Community Movement that merges agriculture and IT through the operation of life cooperative associations, social cooperative associations, and village enterprises, Shim said.
In order to create a resource circulation society, it will engage in the campaign to collect hidden resources and create green jobs by utilizing reuse centers, the city farmer campaign, and the campaign to make food garbage resources.
"In particular, we are negotiating with the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning to strengthen the campaign for the reuse of resources and the conversion of 5.5 million tons of food garbage into new resources annually, while helping those returning to farming after leaving the city by linking them with residents," he said.
As part of its global village community movement, the center will build a systematic and tailor-made education system to educate foreigners hoping to become Saemaul leaders.
"We plan to implement a qualification system for those hoping to become international Saemaul leaders and establish the ‘Saemaul Department’ in cooperation with universities through diversification and standardization of curriculum," he explained.
It plans to establish the Saemaul Undong globalization standard model by developing an integration model for trial countries and an individual model for countries who request it in an attempt to help accelerate developing countries' Saemaul Undong projects.
"Along with this, we project to hold the Global Saemaul Undon Leaders' Conventionand establish the center's overseas branches to actively foster its overseas organizations," he said.
Saemaul Undong archives listed in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register
"Through the listing, we have prepared a positive chance to dispel misunderstandings and prejudice about Saemaul Undong, which had been politically distorted and disparaged by some people. The Saemaul Undong archives will be used as very precious learning materials for developing countries, which are striving to dispel poverty and accelerate the development of agricultural villages.
"The experience of Korea which has become a world power at present through Saemaul Undong will be a valuable spiritual asset contributing to common development of mankind."
Noting that the center is actively propelling a project to make advanced villages based on the active participation of residents, he said, "Villages function as the minimum unit of social capital formation and accumulation, including confidence and integration. Based on this, we will activate town meetings, foster village leaders, and build a cooperative system with churches, enterprises, and other organizations."
In preparation for the aging society, the center is also planning to stage a campaign to promote everyone, from all classes, living together and creating an environment where residents can ponder the regions' pending issues directly and seek solutions together.
Ways to attract people's active participation in Saemaul Undong
The public’s participation in Saemaul Undong is not as active compared with that in the 1970s despite the fact that it holds 2 million members. Shim said, "Accordingly, we will convert the movement into a life-centered movement that the people can feel directly by pursuing consumer-oriented campaign, which can enhance synergy effects through private and government cooperation.”
"Related to this, the center is operating the 'Y-SMU forum' to actively foster young and dynamic next-generation leaders. Since its establishment on May 14, 2011, 35,670 persons from 124 university clubs and 65 youth organizations have been participating in the forum to lead a new change and cultivate global leadership."
Y-SMU forum members have been pushing ahead with such projects as operation of after-school programs for children in multicultural families, on & offline global standard campaign activities, and talent services. They also visit overseas organizations in Laos, Nepal, and Mongolia to engage in educational services, cultural exchanges, and environmental improvement activities for local residents.
On the center's global Saemaul Undong projects, he said, "Up until recently, 55,740 foreigners from 132 countries made an inspection tour of Saemaul Undong villages in Korea or received relevant education. Over the past five years, meanwhile, the center also fostered 996 foreigners from 39 countries, including Mongolia, Nepal, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines, as Saemaul leaders and the know-how of the movement method was handed over to them.”
"At present, the five countries _ Mongolia, Nepal, the People's Republic of Congo, Uganda, and Kyrgyzstan - have established Saemaul Undong communities."
Saemaul Undong globalization project
The center is pushing ahead with the Saemaul Undong globalization project to share Korea's experience of the movement with many other countries.
"In particular, the basic spirits of Saemaul Undong - diligence, self-help, and cooperation - are the universal values of the mankind. All countries can adopt them easily to wipe out poverty and live better. To enhance the effects of Saemaul Undong and share such valuable experiences and know-how, we created the ‘International Forum of Saemaul Undong’ on Oct. 25," he said.
With the goal of developing theInternational Forum of Saemaul Undong into a global organization, he said, "The government will hold the Global Saemaul Undong Leaders' Conventionon April 22 next year with attendance of some 800 domestic and foreign guests to help accelerate globalization of the movement."
