Culture ministry to brief regional governments on five-year regional culture plan

The culture ministry said it will hold regional briefings from Oct. 20 to Nov. 6 to explain the Third Regional Culture Promotion Basic Plan, the five-year policy blueprint that local governments and cultural institutions will be expected to turn into programs.

The briefings will tour six regions: the southeast, covering Busan, Ulsan and South Gyeongsang Province, on Oct. 20; the Daegu-North Gyeongsang region on Oct. 22; Seoul and Gangwon Province on Oct. 27; the Honam region and Jeju on Oct. 30; Incheon and Gyeonggi Province on Nov. 3; and the Chungcheong region on Nov. 6. Each session runs about two hours from 2 p.m. at a venue in the host region, including the National Museum of Daegu and the Asia Culture Center in Gwangju.

The ministry unveiled the plan, which covers 2026 through 2030, on Sept. 15. The briefings are aimed at metropolitan and basic-level local governments and arts and culture organizations that will draft and execute the detailed policies, as well as officials from regional culture foundations, local cultural centers and other cultural institutions.

Each session opens with the ministry's explanation of the plan's vision and main strategies, followed by a presentation from a metropolitan government on its own implementation plan, and a question-and-answer period with ministry and local government officials.

The final briefing, for the Chungcheong region, will be held simultaneously online for institutions that missed earlier sessions and for artists and members of the public interested in regional cultural policy. It will be streamed on the ministry's official YouTube channel.

"The role of local governments and regional cultural institutions in carrying out the plan on the ground is more important than anything else if the Third Regional Culture Promotion Basic Plan is to lead to changes that residents can feel," a ministry official in charge of the policy said. "We will make this briefing a place where the central government and the regions share the policy direction and discuss implementation plans suited to local conditions together. We will work to actively reflect opinions from the field in the policy process going forward."