First Production from Company Based in North Korean Industrial Complex

The first manufactured goods from a Gaeseong Industrial Complex-based company have been produced.

A kitchen utensils company, Living Art (President Kim Seok-cheol), produced pan sets on December 15, becoming the first company in the Gaeseong Industrial Complex to herald in the “Gaeseong era.”

On the morning of December 15, Living Art held a “ceremony commemorating the first production in the Gaeseong Industrial Complex” at its factory located within the complex, in the presence of both North and South Korean personnel.

The first products, 1,000 three-piece pan sets, crossed the demarcation line and were sent to the South at around 2:00 p.m. These products went on sale to regular customers from 6:00 p.m. on the eighth floor sales room of Lotte Department Store located in Sogong-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul.

About 400 South Koreans, including Minister of Unification Chung Dong-young, Korean Red Cross President Han Wan-sang, Hyundai Chairwoman Hyun Chung-eun, representatives from the ruling and minority parties, government personnel, and economic personnel, and about 50 North Koreans such as Director of the Special Economic Zone Development Committee Ju Dong Chan, attended this ceremony. Among the 13 companies that have received approval for cooperative trade in the Gaeseong Industrial Complex, eight of them, including Shinwon, SJTek, SD Trading Co., Bucheon Industries, Taesung Industrial Co., and Magic Micro, have gone into construction of their factories, with Living Art an exception. Shinwon, SJTek and SD Trading Co. plan to complete construction of their factories by the end of the year.

Tae-Han Kim freewill@donga.com