Chairman Cho Seok-rae Stresses Bilateral Economic Cooperation at “Seoul-Tokyo Forum”

At the Seoul-Tokyo Forum held at the Lotte Hotel, Seoul, between November 25 and 27, Chairman Cho urged active promotion of the Korea-Japan FTA, and stressed the need to open Japan’s agro-fishery product markets and resolve issues associated with non-tariff barriers. He said, “The Korea-Japan FTA will facilitate technical development and improve productivity through constructive competition between the two countries,” stressing the need to establish the bilateral FTA that will serve as a foundation for creating an Asian economic community. With regard to cooperative measures between Korean and Japanese companies, he argued that Japanese companies need to expand their investment in Korea and build partnership with Korean companies to jointly make inroads into overseas markets in additional countries.

The 2^nd Seoul - Tokyo Forum was intended to discuss ways to promote bilateral collaboration between the two countries, including holding a symposium on “Korea-Japan Cooperation in Post-quake Japan” as numerous Korean and Japanese experts from academic, business and political fields participated. This year’s event was attended by former Prime Ministers Nam Deok-woo and Lee Hong-gu, Chairman of the Korea-Japan Economic Association Cho Seok-rae, former Japanese Prime Minister Aso Taro, and Mimura Akio, chairman of the Japan Iron & Steel Federation.