On the 7th, the 30th anniversary memorial service for the late Chairman Lee Jong-geun of Gochon was held at the Chongkundang headquarters in Chungjeong-ro, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul. [Photo by Chongkundang]
[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Chun-hee] Chong Kun Dang announced on the 8th that it held a 30th anniversary memorial service for the late founder, Chairman Lee Jong-geun, at its headquarters in Chungjeong-ro, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul on the 7th.
The memorial service was conducted as a memorial worship attended by about 90 people, including Chairman Lee Jang-han of Chong Kun Dang, bereaved family members, Kim Doo-hyun, Chairman of the Chong Kun Dang Gochon Foundation, and executives and employees of Chong Kun Dang and its affiliates.
In his greeting, Chairman Lee Jang-han said, “Gochon was a businessperson who founded and operated a company in an ordinary, small-citizen manner with the conviction that one must live together with others,” adding, “With the belief that ‘Chong Kun Dang pharmaceuticals must always be by the patient’s side,’ we will realize the founder’s will who established the first central research institute in the domestic pharmaceutical industry and will definitely complete a ‘global new drug’ that can cure humanity.”
Kim Doo-hyun, Chairman of the Chong Kun Dang Gochon Foundation, recalled in his eulogy, “Chairman Lee Jong-geun was a true pharmaceutical person who devoted his life to practicing pharmaceutical patriotism,” and “He was always strict and frugal with himself but never hesitated to extend a helping hand to neighbors in need.”
Born in 1919 in Dangjin, Chungnam, Chairman Lee Jong-geun founded Chong Kun Dang in 1941 and established the largest domestic raw material synthesis and fermentation factories in the 1960s and 1970s, achieving the localization of pharmaceutical raw materials that had depended on imports. In 1968, he contributed to the modernization and internationalization of the Korean pharmaceutical industry by exporting the antibiotic ‘Chloramphenicol,’ which was the first in Korea to receive approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), to Japan, the United States, and other countries.
In 1973, he established the Chong Kun Dang Gochon Foundation for scholarship projects, leading the social return of corporate profits, and was awarded the Mugunghwa Medal of the Order of Civil Merit in 1986 in recognition of these contributions. In 2006, the ‘Gochon Award’ was established jointly with the UN-affiliated International Cooperation Agency for Tuberculosis Control in honor of his achievements in leading tuberculosis eradication. In 2010, the Korea Mint Corporation selected the late Chairman Lee Jong-geun as the 52nd figure in the ‘Korean Figures Series Medal’ to commemorate his contributions to the development of the Korean pharmaceutical industry and issued a commemorative medal.
Chong Kun Dang will operate an online memorial hall consisting of online flower offerings, eulogies, a memorial gallery, and memorial videos until the 10th. Anyone can visit through the Chong Kun Dang website to pay their respects.
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