‘Clean Busan Sea Initiative’ United! … Busan City, Marine Organizations, and Citizens

From the 27th to April 7th, Busan City will carry out the "Marine Debris Collection Campaign for a Clean Sea," a two-week intensive effort to collect marine debris from the coastal districts, maritime-related organizations, and citizens along the coast and sea in front of Busan.

Busan City Hall.

This campaign is organized to showcase the clean and beautiful city of Busan’s sea and marine environment to the onsite inspection team of the International Bureau of Expositions (BIE) scheduled for early April. It aims to differentiate Busan from competing cities by demonstrating the strong enthusiasm of its citizens for hosting and promoting Busan’s image as a global marine city worthy of being a candidate city for the Expo.

The campaign is a collaboration between 12 maritime-related organizations and citizens. Participants include Busan City, the Busan Regional Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Office, the Naval Operations Command, the Busan Coast Guard, the Korea Marine Environment Management Corporation, eight coastal districts, and local volunteer groups.

The city expects this campaign to serve as a model of communication and cooperation for creating a clean marine environment. It also hopes that as a citizen-centered participatory event, it will provide an opportunity for many citizens to take an interest in the marine environment.

Busan City is currently implementing projects such as collecting waste from the Nakdong River’s streams and estuaries, supporting sea environment guardians, and marine debris cleanup projects to protect the marine ecosystem and environment.

As a new project for next year, the city plans to propose to the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries national funding support for the "Marine Waste Tire Collection Project (200 million KRW/year)" aimed at reducing marine microplastics, and will continue to carry out various marine environment cleanup activities.

Kim Byung-gi, Director of the Marine Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau of Busan City, said, “By conducting a citizen-centered marine environment protection campaign in preparation for the International Bureau of Expositions (BIE) onsite inspection, we expect not only to enhance the image of the beautiful Busan sea but also to demonstrate Busan’s readiness as a city bidding for the 2030 Busan World Expo.” He added, “Through this campaign, we aim to raise citizens’ interest in the marine environment and will work harder to develop marine environment policies to sustain this momentum. In particular, we will continue to negotiate with the central government to secure national funding for these efforts.”

Schedule of Marine Environment Protection Campaign Events.