President Lee Myung-bak on Thursday unveiled a plan to build an international center for green growth studies in Seoul’s Hongneung area, furthering his efforts to position Korea as a global leader in the field.

“It is my hope to transform Hongneung into a ‘Global Green Growth Park’ to be the world’s mecca of global green technology and knowledge as well as human resource development, to pioneer the next big breakthrough not only for Korea but for the world,” he told a forum in Seoul. 

Speaking at the Global Green Growth Summit, the president reiterated his commitment to turning Asia’s fourth-largest economy greener and spread its experience overseas, a campaign he started in 2008.

The Hongneung center, envisioned to house global green growth bodies, will serve as the country’s think tank and platform for international collaboration, Lee said.

Located in northeast Seoul, Hongneung is currently home to state-run science and technology centers including Korea Institute of Science and Technology, Korea Development Institute and Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade.

Those agencies, however, will move out under a plan to relocate governmental bodies to the new city of Sejong and be replaced by green growth institutes, government officials explained.

Among them is the Global Green Growth Institute, a Seoul-based think tank chaired by former Prime Minister Han Seung-soo which the government plans to turn into an international organization.

The GGGI will formally launch as an international body during a ministerial meeting in Seoul in October aimed at laying the groundwork for the U.N. Climate Change Conference, also known as “COP 18,” set for December in Qatar.

One institute, the Green Technology Center Korea, settled in the area last March.

By Lee Sun-young (milaya@heraldcorp.com)