SK Brand Div. Chief Named PR Man of the Year

The KPRA holds its 20th anniversary event

The Korea PR Association (KPRA) held its 20th PR Day anniversary event at the Plaza Hotel in Seoul on Nov. 5. Among the approximately 500 people on hand at the event were Cho Hae-hyeong, chairman and CEO of Nara Holdings Corp. and concurrent chairman of the 2009 Korea PR Awards Screening Committee; Lee Sun-dong, former KPRA chairman; and current KPRA executives, Seo Kang-soo, director general in charge of publicity support at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and Kim Hee-beom, director of the Korea Culture and Information Service.
Chung Sang-guk, chairman of the KPRA, said in his opening speech, “The KPRA has played a role in invigorating the Korean public relations industry for the past 20 years, and from now on we plan to push ahead with projects to advance PR activities contributing to national development.”
Kwon Oh-yong, executive vice president of SK Brand Management Division, was presented with the 2009 PR Man of the Year Award, while the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST) was honored with the 2009 Korea PR Grand Award.
Kang Chul-won, director general in charge of publicity and planning at the Seoul Metropolitan Government received the Excellence Award in the on-line PR category from KPRA Honorary Chairman Lee Hyung-kyun.The Seoul Metropolitan Government was praised for putting the city government’s administration jargons into the Korean version of Wikipedia. That is a representative project of the municipal governemnt’s efforts to share knowledge by paving the way for citizens to participate in the city government’s affairs via the new media and meeting citizens’ right to know. The KPRA screening committee commented that the SMG was credited with doing a good job in circumstances analysis, study, planning, execution and evaluation. It added that the SMG’s entry is an excellent PR case making the most of the features of the on-line media. In particular, 1,600 contents on information related to the SMG have been updated and 500-odd new contents have been put on the Wikepededia at the hands of citizens during the campaign, thus playing a leading role in expanding the number of knowledge contents to 100,000 on the Korean on-line encyclopedia.
2009 Korea PR Awards Screening Committee Chairman Cho said the 2009 Korea PR Grand Award contest was conspicuous compared to those of previous years with the number of entries considerably rising to 32 and the diversifying of topics to such timely policy issues as green growth, the utilization of environmentally-friendly transportation means and innovation of transportation systems.
The anniversary event included the unveiling of the KPRA’s new corporate identity and the awarding of Korea Accredited in Public Relations (KAPR) certificates to 70 people. nw

(photo from left) KPRA Chairman Chung Sang-guk speaks at the 20th PR Day event. The KPRA chairman poses with Kwon Oh-young, executive vice president of SK Brand Management Division, the winner of the 2009 PR Man of the Year Award. Kang Chul-won, director-general in charge of publicity at the Seoul Metropolitan Government received the Excellence Award in the on-line PR category from KPRA Honorary Chairman Lee Hyung-kyun.