Jeong Seong-bae of Namwon City Receives 'Grand Prize' for Outstanding Case of Young Entrepreneur Farmer Settlement

[Namwon=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Jeong Young-gwon] Namwon City, Jeonbuk, announced on the 9th that Jeong Seong-bae (age 40) won the Grand Prize (Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Award) in the '2022 Young Entrepreneur Farmer Farming Settlement Best Practice Essay Contest.'

Hosted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and organized by the Korea Agency of Education, Promotion and Information Service in Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (NAQS), this contest has been held for the fifth time since 2018 to discover and spread excellent cases of young entrepreneur farmers' farming settlement support projects, motivate prospective farmers, instill pride in young successor farmers, and enhance awareness of agriculture and rural areas.

NAQS received submissions in two categories (new farmers, successor farmers) from 8,600 selected young successor farmers from 2018 to 2022. Through document screening by external experts (field verification, interviews), the final 22 works were selected, and through a vote by all young successor farmers, the Grand Prize (2 works), Gold Prize (4 works), Silver Prize (6 works), and Bronze Prize (10 works) were awarded.

The Grand Prize, the Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Award, comes with a prize money of 1 million KRW.

Jeong Seong-bae was selected as a young entrepreneur farmer in 2018 and has been managing 1 hectare of leafy vegetables (lettuce) in a greenhouse in Unbong-eup, supported by farming settlement subsidies and successor farmer management funds.

In particular, in this contest, he received high scores in various fields such as farming management innovation in the successor farmer category (commercialization of high-quality salad lettuce) and building and cooperating within the local young farmer network.

The two Grand Prize-winning works will be compiled into a best practice collection and distributed to agricultural-related institutions and organizations, and will be used as promotional online content for the young entrepreneur farmer farming settlement support project in the future.

A city official said, "We will do our best to activate communication for sharing various farming settlement cases, overcoming obstacles, and success processes, and to expand the nurturing and support of excellent young farmers in the region so that young farmers can leap forward to Namwon, a city of their dreams."

Namwon=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Jeong Young-gwon baekok@asiae.co.kr