The South Korean government has launched a task force on normalizing the industry, trade, and energy sectors, beginning efforts to identify irrational regulations and practices affecting daily life and business operations.
The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE) held the first meeting of the Industry, Trade and Energy Normalization Task Force on Wednesday, chaired by Vice Minister Moon Shin-hak, the ministry said. The task force comprises government members, including the vice minister and the planning and coordination office director, along with six private-sector experts in industry, resource security, trade, and standards.
At the meeting, participants discussed tasks closely tied to daily life, including blocking the distribution of illegal and substandard products, improving the management of quantity-labeled goods, and revising country-of-origin labeling on online shopping platforms.
Specifically, the task force discussed measures to strengthen monitoring and management systems across the distribution process, including market surveys and import customs inspections, given growing concerns over illegal and substandard products entering the market amid a rise in cross-border online purchases.
Officials also reviewed improvements to prevent cases in which some businesses exploit the current quantity-labeling system — which operates on a permissible margin-of-error basis — to package products with less content than the labeled amount. The meeting also discussed revising country-of-origin labeling standards to reflect the nature of non-face-to-face transactions, as well as measures to expand the joint use of research equipment built with government funding and enhance the openness of equipment operations.
"To uncover abnormal and irrational elements that have been maintained out of habit, we need to approach them from a fundamental perspective and carefully re-examine even familiar problems from a new viewpoint," Vice Minister Moon said. "We will more fully reflect the opinions of users and those on the ground to deliver tangible results for the public."
MOTIE plans to finalize the first round of normalization tasks for the industry, trade, and energy sectors by incorporating the opinions presented at the meeting.
