Yeoncheon-gun Selected for Two Consecutive Years as an Institution Enhancing Agricultural Policy Performance

Yeoncheon-gun, Gyeonggi Province announced on the 18th that it has been selected for two consecutive years as a performance enhancement institution in the ‘2024 Agricultural Policy Evaluation’ hosted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

Yeoncheon County Office building. Provided by Yeoncheon County.

The Agricultural Policy Evaluation is an award given by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs since 1996 to local governments nationwide, assessing policies related to the core rice industry in agriculture.

The evaluation is conducted through a comprehensive analysis of various indicators such as securing stable rice production volume, establishing a foundation for high-quality rice production, and efforts to reduce production costs. This year, particular emphasis was placed on appropriate rice production and efforts to shift to cultivating other crops in paddy fields.

Yeoncheon-gun successfully led the reduction of rice cultivation area and diversification of farmers’ income by promoting the Strategic Crop Direct Payment System and the Rice Reduction Agreement, thereby revitalizing the cultivation of other crops such as paddy soybeans and forage crops.

As a result, Yeoncheon-gun played a leading role in fostering other crops in paddy fields by achieving a 218% fulfillment rate compared to the target area (57.2ha) with a newly applied cultivation area (124.5ha) for strategic crop direct payments compared to the previous year.

An official from Yeoncheon-gun stated, “We will continue to actively promote government policies related to reducing rice cultivation areas to contribute to stabilizing rice prices, and we will do our best to increase farmers’ income by continuously discovering field-customized policies in cooperation with farmers.”