President Yoon Claims Exports Declined Due to the Cargo Truckers’ Strike and Asks for Their Cooperation to Overcome Crisis

President Yoon Suk-yeol receives Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, chair of the People’s Council of Turkmenistan, who delivered a letter from Serdar Berdimuhamedow, president of Turkmenistan, inviting him to visit the Central Asian country, in the Office of the President in Yongsan, Seoul on November 29. Courtesy of the Office of the President

On December 1, President Yoon Suk-yeol asked the Cargo Truckers Solidarity, currently engaging in a strike, to end the walkout and cooperate in overcoming the economic crisis.

Thursday night, President Yoon wrote on social media, “I ask those in the freight transportation business to end the strike and put in your efforts to overcome the economic crisis.” He also wrote, “Inflation and the energy crisis is weighing down on the global economy even before we have completely made our way out of the crisis brought on by Covid.” The president continued and said, “Due to the additional impact of the collective refusal to transport freight by the Cargo Truckers Solidarity, exports in November have declined 14% from the same period last year, and we have recorded a trade deficit of over seven billion dollars.”

President Yoon mentioned how South Korea had managed to achieve the world’s seventh largest volume of exports, after dropping to twelfth following the global financial crisis over a decade ago and argued, “We faced a crisis, but by making changes to our battle array and doing our best in our respective positions, we were able to advance to the next level.” He stressed, “We must overcome the current combination of global crises head-on by boosting exports.” The president also spoke about how in a recent export strategy meeting, representatives of the private sector, public enterprises, financial institutions, and the government all became one and agreed to concentrate their efforts to promote exports. He said, “The government and I will carefully check each and every one of our export strategies so that our companies can run in every corner of the world,” and emphasized, “Such efforts by everyone in the Republic of Korea will most certainly bear fruit.”

President Yoon also mentioned the sudden cold wave that hit the nation and said, “We will operate a situation room to respond to electricity demand so as to prevent any problems in supply and strictly manage power consumption focusing on the public sector.”