Hamyang-gun Holds Evaluation Meeting for the 19th Hamyang Sansam Festival

Actively Reflecting Issues and Improvement Plans
Request to Become Korea's Representative Festival

Hamyang-gun, Gyeongnam Province, held the evaluation meeting for the ‘19th Hamyang Sansam Festival 2024’ at the county office’s large conference room.

About 80 people attended the meeting held on the 11th, including County Governor Jin Byeong-yeong, Hamyang Sansam Festival Chairman Lee Hyeon-jae, CEO of Joongang Sanyangsam Corporation Lee Bo-seong, CEO of Hamyang Sanyangsam Corporation Kim Pan-yeol, and festival committee members, to discuss this year’s Sansam festival evaluation and future festival development plans.

The meeting proceeded in the order of watching a video compiling key scenes of the seven-day festival held from October 3 to 9, evaluation report, discussion, and opinion gathering.

Hamyang County is conducting the evaluation meeting for the "19th Hamyang Wild Ginseng Festival 2024."

According to the evaluation report, among the total visitors of about 250,000, ‘non-local visitors’ accounted for 72.5% (181,250 people), which was higher than ‘local residents’ visitors’ at 27.5% (68,750 people). The number of visitors was about 250,000, showing an increase of about 70,000 compared to about 180,000 last year.

It was analyzed that Hamyang-gun’s active promotion and efforts to raise awareness led to the increase in visitors.

Along with this, the average festival satisfaction score (out of 5 points) rose by 0.45 points from 3.71 last year to 4.16, which is 0.3 points higher than the national average satisfaction score of 3.86 for cultural tourism festivals.

In particular, programs embodying the festival’s identity, such as the ‘Sanmak Festival,’ ‘Find the Golden Sansam,’ and ‘Sansam Digging Experience,’ which are core contents of the Sansam festival, showed high interest, and the newly introduced food court operation system this year also received high satisfaction.

As for issues and development plans, awareness of ‘contributing to regional economic development’ was relatively lower compared to other items, suggesting the need to strengthen links with the local commercial district in the future.

Additionally, compared to nearby festivals such as the Sancheong Herbal Medicine Festival and Geumsan Ginseng Festival, the Hamyang Sansam Festival was evaluated as having limited expansion potential due to its content being confined to ‘Sansam.’ Therefore, opinions were raised to rename the festival to ‘Hamyang Anti-Aging Sansam Festival’ or ‘Hamyang Sangnim Festival’ to newly establish the festival’s identity and to develop diverse and differentiated festival contents.

Moreover, it was analyzed that the festival generated about 18 billion KRW in direct economic effects and about 32.2 billion KRW in economic ripple effects for Hamyang-gun.

Governor Jin Byeong-yeong said, “I ask that the issues and development plans presented in today’s report be actively reflected next year,” and added, “I hope the residents pay more attention to the positive aspects such as the economic effects and the increase in Hamyang-gun’s brand value brought about by the festival rather than negative perceptions.”

Festival Chairman Lee Hyeon-jae said, “I thank all the residents and related parties who worked together for a successful festival despite difficult conditions,” and gave a general comment, “We will humbly accept today’s evaluation results and strive to become a better festival next year.”