I Became Park Jeong-ui’s Nephew - Chapter 210



Only Krnovel

He became Park Jeong-ui’s nephew. – (210)

[Welcome to Daedeok-gun, the new capital of the Republic of Korea.]

This is Chungcheong Province,

The reporter who went to the scene took a picture of the sign hanging at the entrance to the city.

Originally, Daedeok County’s scope was limited to Yeongi County and Daejeon in South Chungcheong Province, but with the addition of Cheonan and Asan, the administrative district was expanded to twice the original size.

The reason why this happened is because of money.

As Korea occupied Songho (old Shanghai) and Jinling (old Nanjing), the economy of the Cheonan-Asan area, which had ports, developed significantly.

If Daedeok County is to function properly as a capital, it must have the sea nearby, but the citizens of Cheonan and Asan responded unfavorably.

“If this is the case, we will have to share the income with the capital city, right?”

“I liked the days when we could eat everything by ourselves….”

Cheonan and Asan monopolized the West Sea trade and made huge profits, and the average income of local residents rose to 410,000 won.

Considering that the income of a skilled worker who is considered middle class in Korea is 280,000 won, it is a huge profit.

However, since Cheonan and Asan have been included in the metropolitan area, the taxes paid by the citizens here will now be invested in Daedeok County.

It is natural to want the taxes I earn and pay to be invested in the region where I live, which is why the public sentiment in the Chungcheong region was not entirely favorable to the relocation of the capital.

“Why don’t we include them?”

“Will things really get better if the capital is moved?”

The Honam region is also full of complaints.

If the Honam region is included in the capital, there will be something to eat here too.

However, Honam region was excluded from the metropolitan area, and voices are being raised asking why we are being excluded.

In this situation, will Daedeok County be populated?

As the head of state feared, the population of the capital was only 380,000.

Including the metropolitan area, the population is 1.42 million, but most of them are concentrated in Cheonan and Asan, where the economy is developed, and the capital serves as a satellite city of the large city.

What will be the fate of Daedeok County in the future?

Will it become an abnormal capital city that depends economically on the surrounding large cities like Washington? The reporter who went to the site captured the appearance of Daedeok County on camera.

“The view isn’t bad.”

I thought it would be ugly because it was a planned city, but the appearance wasn’t bad.

20% of the city’s total area is made up of green space and parks, the roads are well-maintained, and above all, there is a science research complex that the government has been steadily developing.

About 2,000 scientific researchers are produced here every year, but the problem is that the talent produced here is not reinvested in regional development, but rather absorbed into Gyeongseong.

Will a region develop if the talents that have been painstakingly nurtured in the region go to the capital?

Currently, 46% of all doctors in Korea come from Gyeongseong, but these people are not the ones who originally lived in Gyeongseong.

As Gyeongseong became a mecca for medicine, talented people from all regions flocked to Gyeongseong, and Daedeok County also produced many talented people as the government fostered it as a science complex.

But if you don’t have the ability to keep those talents in the region, it’s a complete waste.

So the government moved the capital here.

If the enormous financial resources from Cheonan and Asan are reinvested in education, wouldn’t Daedeok-gun become a city that talented people will naturally seek out?

But this is just a prediction. How long will Cheonan and Asan be satisfied with providing money to the metropolitan area?

The result may be the opposite of what was intended.

So, is the relocation of the capital an adventure? Can it kill two birds with one stone: balanced regional development and nurturing talent?

No one could guarantee that.

***

“Your Majesty, this way.”

This is Daedeok-gun Science Research Complex,

I toured the building and various facilities with my entourage.

A large complex with 4,567 residents, including students and researchers, but this is just the tip of the iceberg.

It has been 18 years since the science research complex was established. How many graduates have they produced during that time?

It was calculated that approximately 3,000 people were employed by pharmaceutical companies, and over 10,000 people entered the construction and civil engineering fields.

If you think about it, Korea’s manufacturing industry started here, but the talents could not stay here and spread out to various regions.

An inevitable development,

Yuhan Corporation, famous for its pharmaceuticals, is a large corporation that has expanded its influence to Taiwan, Jinling, the United States, Japan, and recently, Europe.

How could I be stuck in such a small land like Daedeok-gun when I got a job at a company like this?

Construction – The same goes for civil engineering. Hyundai Engineering & Construction is a large company that operates across the Middle East, Korea, and the United States. How can they keep talented people here in this situation?

It was greedy and realistically impossible, but it was enough to instill the perception that this place was the center of Korean science and technology.

“If you want to get a job at a large company, the best way is to go through Daedeok Research Complex.”

“Then we should move to Asan too.”

“I have to go to Cheonan.”

This is one of the reasons why the population of Cheonan and Asan has increased rapidly.

Daedeok County doesn’t have much to offer other than the research complex, but if you want to send your children to school, there’s no better place to do so.

If Gyeongseong is the mecca of medical school and law, this place is the mecca of employment, and now that the government building has moved there, it can be considered the center of administration.

A city with both strengths and weaknesses,

I emphasized to school officials that the fate of Daedeok County depends on ‘people.’

“Guys, is there a store that often gives out first-prize winning tickets? Is it because the location is good that first-prize winning tickets keep coming out? Of course not. If there is a store where first-prize winning tickets are sold, everyone will go to that store and buy a lottery ticket, thinking, ‘Maybe I can do that too?’

I think that’s what a good place is. How did Gyeongseong become a mecca for medicine and law? Because the infrastructure was laid out and many people gathered there, talented people also gathered there. It became a good place where lottery winnings were high.

Look at Cheonan and Asan. The population has skyrocketed because many people are employed in Daedeok County. I think the fate of this place depends on people. Talents need to keep coming out of here.

Of course, it is the government’s role to provide an environment where talented people can thrive, but the rest is up to the people here. Our talented people need to continue to hit the lottery.”

School officials nodded.

Geographically speaking, Daedeok County is in a position where it needs to be protected by surrounding cities; Cheonan and Asan are the starting point, and it needs to continue to expand its influence in the future.

Only then will the belt called the metropolitan area be completed.

Everyone held the reins tightly because it was a business that had to be looked at for at least 10 years.

***

[Sir, I won the lottery!!]

[Yuhan Corporation to independently produce antibiotics, starting production this month.]

[Economic impact estimated at approximately $49 million]

This is Daedeok County, where the lottery that the head of state had been hoping for has been won.

Researchers affiliated with Yuhan Corporation developed their own antibiotics. Korea has been importing about 1.5 million tons of antibiotics from the United States.

But now that our own production has become possible, we can now be self-sufficient in 1.8 million tons.

What makes this so great is that, just looking at our neighboring country, Japan, they started researching antibiotics in 1878 and completed their own production in 1938.

However, due to the problem of antibiotic resistance, technological limitations were encountered, and proper antibiotics were not developed until the 1960s.

A project that took 100 years to complete, Korea completed it in about 20 years.

As a result of the establishment of Daedeok Research Complex and the government’s concentrated investment,

Although we received technology transfer from Japan and the United States, it was only to the extent of allowing us to copy existing antibiotics.

Self-production is a different area from replication, and the president of Yuhan Corporation also emphasized this point.

“We have been conducting clinical trials for eight years to develop an antibiotic, and this time we have received FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration) approval. If we had stopped at the level of cloning an antibiotic, we would not have received FDA approval.”

Literally a miracle,

Who would have imagined that 30 years ago, a country that was receiving antibiotics from other countries would now be producing them on its own?

The inspired South Korean government decided to build an antibiotic production plant in Asan.

In this way, Daedeok-gun and Asan will have a win-win relationship.

When antibiotics are produced in Asan, Cheonan exports them overseas through its port, and some of the profits return to Daedeok County.

The economic effect of a single antibiotic is estimated to be around 50 million dollars, and the government projects that the average income in the Cheonan-Asan area will rise to 580,000 won.

Of course, this is possible because the population is 1.3 million. If the population had exceeded 9 million like Gyeongseong, it would not have been able to enjoy this level of effect.

It’s actually an advantage to be a small city.

Isn’t it necessary for the metropolitan area to be a mega city with a population of over 5 million? Residents who moved into Daedeok County also responded that this is enough.

But the government was not satisfied with this, and was looking around to scratch another lottery ticket.

***

“Daedeok County has a low public transportation usage rate and a high private car usage rate. The demand for railways will not be that high.”

“No, you should think about it the other way around. Shouldn’t we expand public transportation to suppress demand for private cars?”

This is the Daedeok-gun Government Complex of the Republic of Korea.

I continued to have marathon meetings with administrative officials.

Is it really right to have so many cars on the road in the city?

Even now, in the past, Gyeongseong had terrible traffic jams with people and cars mixing together.

When entering a crowded area, vehicle speeds drop to 15 km/h. Workers even submitted a petition to the government, complaining that their commute was taking too long.

Eventually, the government had to adjust commuting times and reorganize transport routes.

So is this a problem in crowded areas like Gyeongseong?

Daedeok County, which has few people, does not need to worry about such chaos.

It is true that most people drive their own cars and there is no traffic congestion, but as the number of people traveling between Cheonan and Asan increases, the blood vessels are gradually narrowing.

The population is likely to continue to increase in the future, so can we afford to ignore this problem?

There was a clash of opinions between those who argued that public transportation should be expanded to reduce the number of cars traveling to and from the city center and those who argued that this was unnecessary.

There is no need to worry right now, but it is also the role of a leader to look to the future, and I have sought the opinion of the Minister of Statistics.

“How much has the population of Daedeok County increased?”

“It is 400,000, an increase of 20,000 from last year. Including the metropolitan area, it is estimated to be around 1.8 million.”

It hasn’t been that long since the capital was moved, but word of mouth has already spread.

With population growth much faster than expected, there is a possibility that Daedeok County will grow into a medium-sized city with a population of over 2 million, if not a mega city of 5 million.

Considering the traffic flow between Asan and Daedeok, expanding the road would be the best option, but that would disrupt the urban structure.

Is it really best to control vehicles and expand the subway?

The General Affairs Office also concluded that this was the best option.

In this way, Daedeok County was selected as the first city in Korea to control vehicle access, and thanks to this, green space and parks, which accounted for about 20%, were maintained.

It has been evaluated positively even in Europe as a city with unique characteristics different from the crowded Gyeongseong.

[Daedeok-gun, the Copenhagen of the East where nature and civilization coexist exquisitely]

[Showed a successful case of a planned city.]

To this extent, it exceeds expectations.

To be honest, I hesitated to move the capital because I was afraid that Daedeok-gu would turn into a ghost town with a population of less than 300,000.

But who would have thought that this would become such a huge hit?

The local residents are also satisfied with their lives, and I have added another achievement to my political career.