Conditional Land Ownership to Be Granted to Companies Promoting Corporation-cities

The “corporation-city,” which consists of residential and industrial areas alike, is being considered for development in regions outside of the metropolitan and Chungchoeng areas.

In addition, the system of “conditional land ownership,” which permits a company rather than the government to have both the ownership and the right of development of land, and to hand over some part of the developmental profit to the government or local governing body, is being considered for introduction.

According to the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MCT) on June 24, the government has decided to hold the first meeting of the “Working-level Committee to Support the Corporation-city” on June 25 in which the deputy minister of MCT, Choi Jae-deok, bureau director level officials, and civilian experts will participate.

The MCT will promote the construction of corporation-cities in earnest starting next year by selecting one or two model cities and establishing the relevant special laws and decrees this year.

In order to do this, the MCT has decided to organize a system to support the corporation-city development such as establishing the “corporation-city department” under the watch of the New City Planning & Coordination Corps on July 1.

In addition, the Committee for Balanced National Development, reporting directly to the president, is scheduled to organize the “Committee for Supporting the Corporation-city” under its control in order to comprehensively manage the policies and espousing system regarding the corporation-city.

As the balanced development committee grants its highest priority to the repression of overcrowding in the metropolitan area, it is known that the committee is against the establishment of the corporation-cities in the metropolitan and Chungcheong areas.

According to this, “If the corporation-cities are established in developed areas such as the metropolitan and Chungcheong areas and the developmental profit is distributed disproportionately to the companies, the people will not support this,” stated Park Kwang-seo, the chief of New City Coordination Team of MCT, adding, “The corporation-cities will be promoted in order to accomplish well-balanced national land development and stimulate investment.”

In order to stimulate the corporation-city, the MCT is constructively considering the measures which grant land ownership and the right of development, such as the right to sell apartments to the companies and collect the developmental profit by having the companies build a variety of infrastructure such as schools, hospitals, and roads in the cities and contributing to the relevant local governing bodies.

The range and detailed means of collection are scheduled to be discussed in the working-level committee for the corporation-city.

With the industrial complexes and compositely-developed livelihood foundation including housing, school, hospital, and culture centers, the corporation-city will have both the stable manufacturing infrastructure and ideal conditions for livelihood, known as a self-sufficing city. Toyota City in Aichi, Japan is selected as a representative corporation-city. In the respect that a company takes initiative of development, it is different from the industrial complexes, in which only the manufacturing facilities were developed by the government or local governing bodies.

Kwang-Hyun Kim kkh@donga.com