Hwaseong City Takes the Lead in Fostering Social Ventures

ESG·Social Venture Forum Held
"1 Trillion Won Fund Formation Planned"

Hwaseong City in Gyeonggi Province is pushing to establish a fund worth 100 billion KRW to promote ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) expansion and foster social ventures.

On the 6th, Hwaseong City announced on the 7th that it held the '2024 Hwaseong City ESG & Social Venture Forum' at Suwon Science College SINTEX to promote social venture startups and sustainable management.

On the 6th, attendees at the '2024 Hwaseong City ESG·Social Venture Forum' held at Suwon Science College pledged to foster social ventures for sustainable management. Photo by Hwaseong City

At the forum held under the theme of 'A New Leap for Hwaseong City Social Venture Companies,' Son Im-seong, Vice Mayor of Hwaseong City, unveiled the 'Hwaseong City 5-Year Basic Plan' for fostering social ventures. A 'social venture' is a company established to provide innovative and systematic solutions to achieve social goals.

The city plans to operate the 'Hwaseong City Social Venture Startup Support Program' next year to expand ESG. In particular, the city aims to discover 50 social ventures annually and establish an impact fund worth 100 billion KRW by 2026 to support social ventures.

At the forum, the city also signed a tripartite agreement with the Korea Technology Finance Corporation under the Ministry of SMEs and Startups and the Social Value Research Institute, a foundation funded by SK Group, to support social venture startups and growth. According to the agreement, these institutions will cooperate for five years to provide education, consulting, and evaluation support for social ventures, as well as develop new indicators to assess the technological value of social ventures.

The forum consisted of three sessions: ▲ Forum for promoting Hwaseong City social venture policies ▲ Open innovation forum for promoting large corporations’ technology cooperation projects ▲ Social venture investment competition. In addition to the Korea Technology Finance Corporation and the Social Value Research Institute, major corporate investors such as Hoban Construction and Kyobo Life Insurance also attended the event.

Vice Mayor Son said, "Now is the time to prepare so that Hwaseong City's social economy can take a new leap forward along with the development of sustainable management," adding, "I hope all companies actively participate together in solving social problems that the existing social economy has been responsible for."