Next year's R&D budget to be cut by 4.6 trillion won

Yoon Jae-ok (center), acting leader of the Grand National Party, and Hong Ik-pyo (second from left), leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, announce an agreement on the 2024 budget bill at the National Assembly Operations Committee room in Yeouido, Seoul, Tuesday. From left, Kang Hoon-sik of the Democratic Party of Korea, acting chairman Hong Ik-pyo, Yoon Jae-ok of the People\'s Power, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance Chu Kyung-ho, and Song Eon-seok of the National Assembly. National Assembly Press Corps

The ruling People's Power Party (PPP) and the main opposition Minjoo Party agreed on the scale and details of next year's budget on December 20. The ruling and opposition parties are expected to cut 4.2 trillion won from the original government budget proposal of 657 trillion won and increase other budgets to meet the total amount. The budget for research and development and the budget for issuing local gift vouchers, which have been controversial issues between the parties, were slightly increased compared to the government's proposal.

Yun Jae-ok and Hong Ihk-pyo, floor leader of the ruling and opposition parties, respectively, met at the National Assembly and made a final agreement to hold a plenary session on the 21st to deal with next year's budget and revenue bills.

The parties specified in the agreement that they would cut 4.2 trillion won from the government's proposal, but they did not disclose the details of the cut. Since they also did not reveal the scale of the increase, the total amount of spending remains unknown. However, the final government proposal is expected to be worth 657 trillion won.

Song Eon-seok, PPP’s secretary of National Assembly's Special Committee on Budget, said, "4.2 trillion won will be reduced from the total amount of spending the government submitted to the National Assembly and some 4.2 trillion won will be increased after reflecting individual projects. But if the increase is not made, the total amount could be partially reduced." Kang Hoon-sik, Minjoo Party’s secretary of the committee, also said, "The total scale of budget is the same as the government proposal of 657 trillion won."

The budget increase specified by the ruling and opposition parties in the agreement is 1.2 trillion won, including research and development, local gift vouchers, and the budget for the Saemangeum project. The parties said they would release the details of the remaining 3 trillion won increase out of the 4.2 trillion won increase on the 21st.

Regarding the research and development budget, the ruling and opposition parties decided to increase a net 600 billion won in the government's proposal to ease the employment insecurity of field researchers, strengthen research on next-generation original technologies, and support the latest high-performance research equipment. Earlier, the government submitted a budget proposal to the National Assembly that slashed next year's research and development budget by 5.16 trillion won (16.6 percent) from this year's 31.78 trillion won. The Minjoo Party aimed to restore 1.5 trillion won in the government's proposal, but ended up securing less than half of the increase.

The ruling and opposition parties also decided to add 300 billion won to the budget to support the issuance of local gift vouchers. This is 405.3 billion won less than the budget of 705.3 billion won for local gift vouchers that the Minjoo Party unilaterally passed amid the absence of the PPP lawmakers at the plenary session of the National Assembly's Public Administration and Security Committee last month. In the government's original proposal, there was no budget allocated for local gift vouchers. The budget for the Saemangeum project will be increased by 300 billion won to support seamless management activities and private investment attraction of companies operating there.

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.