The South Korean government yesterday announced it will increase its investment in local plant and animal breeding efforts to 1.05 trillion won (US$845m) over the next 11 years.
Korea’s Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said the move was part of efforts to increase the import-heavy country’s food security and boost seed exports in an increasingly competitive field, reported the JoongAng Daily.
“The goal is to increase the size of exports by the local seed and livestock breeding industries from US$30m last year to US$200m in 2020,” said ministry official Kim Jong-hoon.
Funding for breeding programmes stood at 52.4bn won (US$44m) this year, which will be gradually increased to 143bn won (US$120m) by 2020.
Korea wants to play a bigger part in the growing global breeding market, which the ministry said was worth US$36.7bn in 2007.
