Jeonnam Fire Department Ensures No Discrimination Based on Nationality or Race in Providing Safety Services

Measures to Strengthen Fire Safety for Foreign Residents

Production of Multilingual Disaster Action Guidelines and More

The Jeonnam Fire Headquarters is implementing fire safety enhancement measures for foreign residents who have difficulty obtaining safety information due to language and cultural differences.

This is to create a safe society together under the goal that there should be no discrimination based on nationality or race in providing fire safety services.

On the 20th, the Jeonnam Fire Headquarters announced that it will promote the ‘Jeollanam-do Foreign Residents Fire Safety Measures’ in response to the continuously increasing number of foreigners.

On the same day, the ordinance proposal ‘Jeollanam-do Foreign Residents Fire Safety Support’ for fire safety and various disaster responses for foreign residents, which was jointly proposed by Jeonnam Provincial Assembly member Kim In-jeong, was also approved at the 2nd plenary session of the 378th extraordinary meeting.

According to the ‘2022 Local Government Foreign Resident Status’ announced by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the number of foreign residents living in Jeonnam is 73,183, accounting for 4.1% of the Jeonnam population, and the growth rate is 9.4%, higher than the national average growth rate of 5.8%.

Accordingly, Jeonnam Fire Headquarters decided to promote this safety measure to prevent safety accidents involving foreigners and to establish various fire-related matters to create a safe environment for foreigners.

In collaboration with the Provincial Population and Youth Immigration Office, Foreigners Support Center, and others, fire safety facilities for residential use will be distributed to foreign residents, and multilingual promotional materials on action guidelines for each type of disaster will be produced to create a safe residential environment.

Using a mobile safety experience vehicle, experiential education will be conducted separately for children and adults, and experience booths will be operated in connection with multicultural festivals and foreigner events in the province.

By utilizing the Multicultural Volunteer Fire Brigade, a global 119 safety instructor group will be formed and operated to expand visiting fire safety education.

Joint inspections and fire drills at foreigner protection facilities will be regularized, and multilingual medical questionnaires for foreign emergency patients will be produced to establish a rapid response system for protecting foreign residents.

Hong Young-geun, the head of the headquarters, said, “Foreign residents may have difficulty obtaining safety information and be vulnerable to disasters due to language and cultural differences,” and added, “We will strive for fire safety regardless of nationality or race.”