On April 23, Incheon City announced that it has established the "2025?2029 Basic Plan for Fostering the Aviation Industry" to proactively respond to the future aviation sector.
The city has set its vision as "Incheon, a Global Leading Aerospace Innovation City," and has outlined five major strategies and 18 action tasks. These include revitalizing the Incheon International Airport economic zone, building an aviation maintenance (MRO) industry ecosystem, promoting the commercialization of urban air mobility (UAM), creating a drone industry demonstration cluster, and establishing a foundation for the growth of the space and defense industries.
Going forward, the city plans to expand the airport economic zone by linking Incheon Airport with nearby industrial complexes. To achieve this, it will support the enactment of a special law and strengthen cooperation with Incheon International Airport Corporation.
In the aviation maintenance sector, the city aims to prevent the outflow of maintenance demand overseas by revitalizing maintenance complexes and attracting private maintenance companies. In the urban air mobility sector, it will establish demonstration routes and improve regulations in parallel, creating an Incheon-style UAM ecosystem through an integrated management system.
Additionally, the city will support pilot projects for converting Incheon's manufacturing industry to the aviation sector, serving as a bridge for job creation. It also plans to establish an aviation maintenance hub by expanding aviation-specialized education programs for young people through industry-academia-research collaboration.
Alongside these efforts, the city will utilize drones for island goods delivery and marine waste management, and will also create an industrial ecosystem to foster the space industry.
Incheon City plans to conduct a feasibility study for the establishment of a "Defense Venture Center" to foster small and venture companies with defense-related technologies. Through this, the city aims to lay the groundwork for collaboration between the Defense Acquisition Program Administration and local governments, and to explore the potential for expanding the regional defense industry ecosystem in the future.
An Incheon City official stated, "Incheon is the ideal location for the aviation industry, as it can utilize both the airport and the port," adding, "We will do our utmost to foster the aviation industry to create jobs and stimulate economic growth."
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
