Seoul to assist acquisitions of foreign firms

A presidential council said Tuesday it will support Korean businesses’ mergers and acquisitions of foreign companies as part of efforts to raise national competitiveness, benchmarking a Chinese policy.

“We will seek to strengthen Korean companies’ global investment capabilities to encourage M&As of competent overseas firms, especially in the energy and resources sector,” Kang Man-soo, chief of the Presidential Council on National Competitiveness, said in his report to President Lee Myung-bak.

Beijing has backed Chinese businesses’ overseas M&As since 2009, using its $2 trillion foreign reserves.

Kang said the scope of asset management by the sovereign wealth fund Korea Investment Corporation will be expanded to help finance M&As abroad.
The report was made as President Lee on Tuesday presided over a meeting with presidential panels to review the Seoul G20 summit and discuss the nation’s post-G20 tasks to become a global leader.

The meeting, which was initially scheduled to be held on Nov. 25, was postponed due to North Korea’s artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island on Nov. 23.

“Clearly, things should be different before and after the Seoul G20 summit,” Lee said, adding that the summit was a starting point for Korea’s role in the international community as a “top-notch, mature and democratic nation.”

“I believe it is necessary to think about the path Korea should take over the next 10 or 20 years,” he said.

The Presidential Council for Future and Vision emphasized the need to expand free trade agreements, promote a multicultural society and adopt a realistic policy on North Korea.

“It is our first duty to let the next generation live in a safe economic and social environment without fears of provocations by the North,” the council said in a report.

The Presidential Advisory Council on Education, Science and Technology suggested reforming school culture to help students grow into law-abiding citizens and revising elementary and middle school curricula to promote respect for different cultures.

The Presidential Committee on Green Growth said it would spread around the experience of developing the nation’s four main rivers as a model of climate control and seek to host the 18th Conference of the parties under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The Presidential Council on Nation Branding laid out plans to increase contributions to the international community by sending more volunteers, retired teachers and public officials abroad.

As part of follow-up measures to the G20 summit, Seoul plans to open a graduate school that specializes in development issues and a think tank that studies global economic governance.

The state-run Korea Development Institute is preparing to open the graduate school, tentatively named the Seoul G20 Development Graduate School, in the spring semester, Lee’s spokesperson Kim Hee-jung said.

Lee Jong-hwa, a Korea University professor and the president’s newly appointed economic advisor, has been named as the sherpa for the next G20 summit in Cannes, France, in November, Kim said.

By Kim So-hyun (sophie@heraldcorp.com)