Grave Concerns about Reducing SOC Budget Next Year

Recently the Korean government announced that the Social Overhead Cap
ital (SOC) budget for the coming fiscal year would be cut 18 percent.
Concerned about this, relevant industries worried about the decision a
nd asked that the government think it over again.
Logistic and construction companies were concerned about these plans a
ffecting inter-Korean business cooperation and the working situation o
f relevant industries. Analysts anticipated that as the social welfare
and environment preservation budgets increase, and the cooperation be
tween the two Koreas becomes more active, it will drain the government
budget in coming years. But they said that it is still too early to r
educe the SOC budget because Korea? SOC is far behind other competing
and advanced countries. Especially now the SOC budget is needed more
in preparing for the acquisition of other social fundamentals.
Shipping industries said that if the SOC budget were reduced then it w
ould again provoke container terminal delays and other problems in oce
an transportation. So they insisted that the SOC budget reduction must
be reconsidered.