2009 Cheonan Well-Being Food Expo

Mayor Sung aims to make the food industry a futuristic growth engine, producing well-being traditional Korean foods

The following is a written interview with Cheonan City Mayor Sung Moo-yong in connection with the 2009 Cheonan Well-being Food Expo from Sept. 11-20.
Cheonan City, South Chungcheong Province, will host the well-being food expo with the theme "Taste of Life, Healthy Life" at the Cheonan Three-way Crossroads Park. Mayor Sung, in the third year of his second term in office, said agriculture in the 21st century should cease to be just a business of producing food crops, but rather, it should take on such additional work as food processing and distribution in conjunction with the service industry and should be guided to become a new and prosperous industry to make farm life more affluent, the mayor stressed in the interview.
As more foreign food and foodstuffs are being imported into the country due to the liberalization of foreign food import regulations, the demand for strict safety regulation on agricultural products and foodstuffs has been rising, exacerbated by the melamine fiasco in China, the controversy regarding the import of U.S. beef and a number of problems associated with school food service.
Question: Indiscriminate agricultural product imports since the liberalization of some import regulations have been destroying the public's confidence in the safety of the food market. With this in mind, the 2009 Cheonan Well-Being Food Expo is regarded as very significant. Can you give us some background on the decision to hold such an event?
Answer: We have been agonizing over what we should do to secure the competitive power of our farms and present a new vision and hope, as we watch the difficult conditions and environment for our farm communities. We came to the conclusion that the only way is to develop the food industry. Agriculture is rooted in nature, and the earthly environment is not limited to farm towns, but its problems should be solved with local and central governments working together, I think.
Agriculture in the 21st century should be developed in combination with food processing, distribution and the service industry and let it grow as a futuristic industry with high added value. We came to the conclusion that we should hold the upcoming expo to spotlight a healthy life and awaken the country to the precious value of food safety, which will lead to environmentally friendly "Well-being" farm communities.
It is really disheartening to see that the young generation doesn't see the superiority of our traditional foods that have existed for over 5,000 years and the world recognizes its value as well-being food. The upcoming expo will awaken the public to the value of traditional foods and cultural heritage.
The event will be doubly significant because international exhibitions and expos held so far in the country have been short of information on food as a whole.
The outcry for food safety has never been higher than now with the heated argument regarding U.S. beef imports, which resulted in candlelight vigils, and the melamine in milk in China, sounding alarms for food safety across the country. Through the expo, we plan to address the issues one by one and present solutions. The expo will be lively and will showcase the necessity for school lunches made from environmentally friendly food items and it will be a place to instill trust in consumers and an understanding of fresh, clean and safe foods.
The words 'Well-being' means a lifestyle dedicated to the pursuance of a happy life through a healthy mind and body, an organic balance for physical and spiritual life, having been derived from such words as health, happiness, well and being.
The World Health Organization in 1974 defined health as a sound state across the physical, mental and social aspects in a wider sense of the word, not just a state without disease.
Climate change is intensifying because of industrialization and the use of fossil fuels. The environment is being destroyed from an excessive use of chemical fertilizers and the dangers to humans from the yellow sands, SARS, bird flu and mad cow disease are growing. As such, the earth is being dilapidated continuously and people have only been pursuing the development of culture and convenience. The food culture also has been deluged with fast and junk foods, causing adult diseases to develop rapidly.
Under such circumstances, Cheonan has decide to hold the expo to spur the spread of the well-being culture to pass it to the next generation so that they will keep the 'ife' industry a fresh and safe one with well-being foodstuffs. nw

Mayor of Cheonan City Sung Moo-yong

The second part of this report will be continued in the March issue.