South Korea has signed a series of memorandums of understanding with Ethiopia to strengthen cooperation in the health sector, health ministry officials here said Friday.

The agreement was made in Addis Ababa as South Korean President Park Geun-hye and her Ethiopian counterpart Hailemariam Desaleg watched their representatives sign four MOUs in the health care sector and one MOU in the social welfare sector, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said.

The MOUs call for, among other things, advancing a broad range of joint research and public health collaborations, and exchanging medical personnel such as doctors, the ministry said.

Seoul's top-notch Seoul National University College of Medicine, Seoul National University Hospital and the Korea Foundation for International Healthcare agreed to help train doctors at the newly opened heart center of St. Paul's Hospital here, ministry officials said.

The ministry also said the Korea Health Industry Development Institute and its Ethiopian counterpart, the Pharmaceutical Fund and Supply Agency, agreed to strengthen partnerships in ways such as co-hosting various seminars.

The ministry will also share its knowledge in the social welfare sector with Ethiopia's Ministry of Labor Social Affairs.

It marks the first time that the Seoul government has inked an MOU in the social welfare sector with an African country, officials said.

Separately, South Korea's state-run utility firm Korea Electric Power Corp. inked MOUs with two Ethiopian electric power companies as part of efforts to make inroads into the emerging energy market of the East African region, KEPCO officials said.

Improvement of the African country's electric power infrastructure will be a key area of cooperation, the officials said.

Also, the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, one of South Korea's largest business lobbies, said it has signed an MOU with Ethiopian Chamber of Commerce and Sectorial Associations to expand investment between the two countries.

Under the agreement, the two sides will work on bilateral economic cooperation in the private sector such as establishing a private committee. (Yonhap)