Gyeonggi Province to Provide 1% Annual Business Loans to Farming and Fishing Households Affected by Heavy Rain

Gyeonggi Province will provide loans totaling 5.8 billion KRW at an annual interest rate of 1% to farming and fishing households in the province affected by heavy rainfall. In addition, the province will give priority to these affected households when they apply to participate in Gyeonggi Province's support programs.

On August 11, Gyeonggi Province announced that it had established a comprehensive support plan to help farming and fishing households that suffered large-scale damage recover their operations and restore their facilities.

The support targets are farming and fishing households in four cities and counties?Gapyeong, Pocheon, Anseong, and Icheon?that were affected by the heavy rainfall between July 16 and 20. These households must be registered in the National Disaster Management System (NDMS).

Gyeonggi Province will first provide loans totaling 5.8 billion KRW at a low interest rate of 1% per year to disaster-affected agricultural and fisheries businesses starting next month, to support their management and facility needs. In addition, for disaster-affected fishing households, the province will subsidize the costs of renovating facilities such as electrical equipment and piping through aquaculture facility renovation projects.

Furthermore, the province will revise the implementation guidelines for eight projects, including next year’s customized agricultural policy programs, to ensure that disaster-affected households are given priority when selecting beneficiaries.

Gyeonggi Provincial Government

Gyeonggi Province is also working to help stabilize the incomes of farmers affected by disasters. The Gyeonggi Agro-Fisheries Promotion Agency will operate the Gyeonggi Damtteul regular direct agricultural product market (Doraemi Market) at Gyeonggi Damtteul in Gwanggyo, Suwon (Gyeonggi Convergence Town Square) eight times until November, on Fridays (15:00?20:00) and Saturdays (10:00?17:00), to improve farmers' incomes and provide fresh and safe food.

Gyeonggi Province will give priority to farmers and agricultural organizations from areas affected by heavy rainfall when selecting participants for the markets to be held on August 22?23 and 29?30. In addition, when accepting applications for military supply projects in border areas, the province will prioritize disaster-affected farms.

Park Jongmin, Director of the Department of Agro-Fisheries and Life Sciences at Gyeonggi Province, said, "We will mobilize all possible policy measures to actively support farmers and fishers struggling due to the recent heavy rainfall, help them overcome operational difficulties, and also prepare measures to stabilize their incomes."

Meanwhile, it has been tallied that 1,075 farming and fishing households in the four cities and counties of Gapyeong, Pocheon, Anseong, and Icheon suffered a total loss of 6.4 billion KRW due to damage to farmland, crops, agricultural machinery, facilities, livestock, and aquaculture facilities caused by the heavy rainfall between July 16 and 20.