Korean food and entertainment giant CJ Group has set its culture business infrastructure drive in full throttle to help organize the “Friends of K-Culture” project, which is part of its ‘‘creating shared value” program that involves hosting a series of cultural events for the foreign community in Korea.

The project, launched this year for the first time, takes advantage of the group’s three key business areas ― food, entertainment and culture ― utilizing the various platforms owned by CJ to carry out each event, while also giving foreigners opportunities to learn about and experience Korean culture in a desirable environment.

“CJ is probably one of the few, if not the only, global groups in Korea that can execute this type of CSV curriculum, given that we are a culture-driven firm with all the right kinds of resources,” said Jeon Soon-dal from CJ’s PR department.

The program offers a different event every other month for six events scheduled in 2014, most recently a Korean film screened with English subtitles. In January, the group hosted a Korean cooking experience.

Although “Friends of K-Culture” is unlike the group’s typical CSV projects, it is expected to provide the company with an indirect CSV effect, according to Jeon.

“Not only is this a chance to show the foreign community the nature of CJ and the type of work we aim to do, but it holds meaning in the fact that we are able to provide all of the components from our own platforms and resources,” she said.

“Because the project is still in its initial phase, we have so far had to invite our own guests (mainly opinion leaders), but in the future, once the program fully takes off, we hope to expand our boundaries and accommodate more foreigners,” Jeon added.

The participants of the film screening event seemed pleased. “It is triply good because, one, we know it’s for a good cause, two, it’s not everyday we’re invited to watch a Korean movie provided with English subtitles and, three, we get to see our friends,” said Ecuadorian Ambassador to South Korea Nicolas Trujillo.

By Kim Joo-hyun (jhk@heraldcorp.com)