SK Innovation raises 3.6 billion won to support its suppliers

The mutual growth fund will be provided to 6,658 employees at SK Innovation’s 74 suppliers, and will also be spent on accident insurance renewals and employee welfare programs.

SK Innvoation Vice Chairman Kim Jun, fifth from left, poses for a photo during a grant ceremony held on Tuesday at SK Innvoation's Ulsan Complex. [SK INNOVATION]

SK Innovation raised 3.6 billion won ($2.9 million) to support its suppliers, the company said Tuesday.

The mutual growth fund will be provided to 6,658 employees at SK Innovation’s 74 suppliers, and will also be spent on accident insurance renewals and employee welfare programs.

Of the 3.6 billion won fund, 3.2 billion was from SK Innovation’s charity fund based on a 1 percent donation of each SK Innovation employee's base wage and a matching grant contribution from the company. The rest was raised from the government-backed joint employee welfare fund.

SK Innovation has been raising the mutual growth fund for its suppliers since 2018.

The grant ceremony was held Tuesday at SK Innovation’s Ulsan oil refinery complex, with Ulsan’s Deputy Mayor Seo Jeong-wook, and Chairman Lee Yoon-cheol of the Ulsan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in attendance.

Kim Jun, SK Innovation vice chairman, and Park Yool-hee, head of SK Innovation’s labor union, also attended the Tuesday event.

“For the past 60 years, SK Innovation has made leaps forward and achieved growth by overcoming big and small challenges with our suppliers,” said Kim.

“Such mutual growth and trust will be the driving force for the next 60 years.”

Park of the labor union said that “SK Innovation has been enhancing trust, win-win growth and cooperative relations with the suppliers” through the mutual growth fund for the past 6 years.

BY SHIN HA-NEE [shin.hanee@joongang.co.kr]