Yeongcheon Designated as Nation's First 'Peony Production Area'... Annual Production of 500 Tons

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Koo Dae-seon] Yeongcheon City, Gyeongbuk, has been newly designated as a ‘Peony Production Area,’ used as an ingredient in traditional Korean medicine.

To stabilize the supply and demand of major domestic agricultural products, city and provincial governors designate production areas. To be designated as a production area, the cultivation area and production volume must meet the standards for items designated by the Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

The designation criteria for the peony item production area require a cultivation area of 50 hectares or more. Since 2020, Yeongcheon City has seen an increasing trend in cultivation area, and as of 2023, about 300 farms mainly in Sinnyeong-myeon and Hwanam-myeon cultivate 110 hectares. The production volume is 500 tons annually, accounting for 34% of the national production.

Peony cultivation complex in Yeongcheon, Gyeongbuk.

Yeongcheon City, a special zone for the herbal garlic industry, was designated as a ‘Garlic Production Area’ last year and has now been designated as the first peony production area nationwide. Accordingly, various projects to revitalize the herbal garlic industry special zone and the garlic-peony production area are expected to be carried out.

Yeongcheon City plans to continuously promote Yeongcheon peony through the Peony Flower Festival, which has been held since 2019. Last year, the Gyeongbuk Herbal Agricultural Cooperative was selected for the national government-funded field crop joint management support project, securing a stable production base by inducing the establishment of peony sorting, processing, and storage facilities and organizing production area farms with a project budget of 1 billion KRW. Peony was selected as a strategic item in Yeongcheon City’s horticultural industry development plan from 2023 to 2027 and will be fostered accordingly.

Choi Ki-moon, Mayor of Yeongcheon City, said, “Until now, the herbal sector of Yeongcheon’s herbal garlic industry special zone has been recognized as a distribution hub, but with this peony production area designation, we expect the scope to expand to a production hub as well.” He added, “Along with policy support for supply and demand stabilization, we will support production farms to steadily expand the cultivation area and strengthen our position as a production area.”