Pohang City Achieves Dream of Becoming a 'Global Bio Hub City' Through Creativity, Convergence, and Innovation!

Establishment of Future Growth Biohealth and Infrastructure, Pohang-type Bio 'Research-centered Medical School'

National Projects to Drive Innovative Growth in Bio Industry Including 'Green Bio Venture Campus' Begin in Earnest

September Bio

At the 'Business Agreement Ceremony for Training Physician-Scientists and Fostering the Biohealth Industry in Korea' held in October last year, Pohang City, Gyeongbuk Province, POSTECH, and six hospitals in the Pohang area agreed to mutually cooperate for the establishment of a medical school.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Dongguk Lee] Pohang City is accelerating its leap to become a "world-class bio hub city" in the biohealth industry sector, which is being nurtured as a future new growth industry through the values of "creativity, convergence, and innovation" this year.

The city is fully committed to advancing as a global hub city with "super-gap" competitiveness through proactive preparation and response based on the core development strategy of the future new growth industry's "3+1 New Economic Map (Biohealth, Battery, Hydrogen + Steel Advancement)."

Among them, the "biohealth industry" is gaining attention as a key future growth engine due to global population aging and the COVID-19 pandemic.

In line with this global trend, the government has adopted "leap to a global biohealth-centered nation" as one of its 120 national tasks, preparing for definite change and growth.

In step with this policy, Pohang City has early recognized the bioindustry as a future food source and is building the corresponding capabilities and infrastructure, gaining attention as a "new biomecha."

The city boasts excellent infrastructure such as the nation's only 3rd and 4th generation synchrotron radiation accelerators, world-class research universities POSTECH and Handong University, the venture startup platform for promising bio companies "Bio Open Innovation Center," and Pohang Technopark, a startup incubation and business support institution.

Especially, centered on the Pohang Convergence Technology Industrial Complex, designated as a small but strong research special zone, the city has established differentiated competitiveness through the concentration of bio infrastructure including the "Membrane Protein Research Institute," the third in the world after Germany and the United States and a global center for new drug development; the "Green Vaccine Demonstration Support Center," the nation's first commercial plant vaccine facility; and the "Knowledge Industry Center," a specialized space for venture and small-medium enterprises.

Correspondingly, practical corporate investments continue.

While promoting the establishment of the "K-Hub Science Park," investments from promising domestic bio companies such as Biopharma and BioApp are ongoing, helping Pohang emerge as a "Pohang-type biohealth cluster."

This year, Pohang City is actively promoting the "Green Bio Venture Campus Construction Project (national budget 16.1 billion KRW)" to nurture specialized companies related to green bio, which is gaining attention in smart agriculture and alternative foods, in close communication with the government and in line with government policies for greater advancement.

Additionally, the city is advancing the "Animal Green Bio Pharmaceutical Industrialization Hub Project" (national budget 7.5 billion KRW) for animal green vaccine process development, standardization, and green bio pharmaceutical industrialization, as well as the construction of the "Marine Biomedical Demonstration Research Center" (tentative name) (national budget 15 billion KRW) for convergence research and demonstration utilizing the abundant marine resources of the East Sea. Through selection and promotion of national public projects that maximize Pohang's capabilities and resources, the city aims to enhance competitiveness to lead the "K-Bio" market.

Alongside this, the city expects synergistic effects for innovative growth of the bioindustry by establishing a win-win ecosystem among industry, academia, research, and government related to the biohealth industry through the hosting of the "Gyeongbuk Bio Life Expo" in September this year, widely promoting the bio city image domestically and internationally.

In particular, for the city's long-cherished project of establishing the "nation's first engineering-based research-oriented medical school," Pohang has been collaborating closely with the world-class research university POSTECH for several years, aiming to nurture "future-type physician-scientists" through the establishment of a "locally led research-oriented medical school," not prioritizing the metropolitan area, and is pouring continuous effort and passion into this goal.

Lee Kang-deok, Mayor of Pohang, expressing his opinion to build consensus on the establishment of a research-oriented medical school at POSTECH during the "Minister of Health and Welfare Physician-Scientist Training Meeting" jointly hosted by Pohang City, the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Gyeongbuk Province, and POSTECH.

In this regard, the city was finally selected last May as part of the new government's 120 national tasks and the Gyeongbuk regional policy tasks of the transition committee, drawing active consensus from the government and stakeholders.

In October 2022, the city signed a "Joint Promotion Regional Hospital Business Agreement for Establishing a POSTECH Research-Oriented Medical School" based on win-win cooperation with the only regional medical community nationwide, and plans to secure the legitimacy of the future medical school establishment through differentiated strategies such as opening the POSTECH Graduate School of Medical Science this year, which will lay the foundation for the research-oriented medical school.

In November last year, Minister of Health and Welfare Kyo-hong Cho personally visited POSTECH and held a "Physician-Scientist Training Meeting," engaging in sufficient discussion and consensus on the research-oriented medical school establishment plan. The city is making every effort to achieve the final task of "medical school establishment approval" along with concrete results that differentiate it from other cities.

Mayor Kang-deok Lee of Pohang said, "The biohealth industry is the best choice for sustainable development of local cities lacking medical and welfare infrastructure beyond just a new food industry in the era of regional extinction," adding, "We will do our best to become a model case overcoming regional extinction by accelerating the core projects in the biohealth field that the city is focusing on and the promotion of the POSTECH research-oriented medical school establishment."