K-Dramas Are Selling, but How Accurately Are They Reflected in Export Statistics?

KCTI Hosts Forum on Advancing Export Statistics for Content and Arts
Exploring Development of Indicators Reflecting Digital Content, IP, and Service Transactions

The Korea Culture and Tourism Institute has initiated discussions to advance the export statistics of K-Culture.

The Korea Culture and Tourism Institute held the 7th Hallyu Economy Research Forum 2026 on the 18th at the Conference House Dalgabie in Seoul, under the theme "Writing New Export Statistics in the Era of K-Culture."

The Korea Culture and Tourism Institute announced that it held the "2026 Hallyu Economy Research Forum" on the 18th at the Conference House Dalgabi in Seoul under the theme "The K-Culture Era: Rewriting Export Statistics."

This forum was organized to discuss ways to enhance the accuracy of statistics for export data in the cultural arts and content sectors, with the participation of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and related organizations. The need for advanced statistics arose from the fact that cultural arts and content exports often occur in intangible forms such as digital content, licenses, production services, and exhibition services, making them difficult to capture with conventional export statistics alone.

The keynote presentation was given by Lee Yongkwan, Director of the Hallyu Economy Research Center at the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute. Director Lee diagnosed the current status and limitations of export statistics for cultural arts and content under the topic "Development Strategies and Challenges for Export Statistics of the Cultural Creative Industry," and presented directions for developing indicators and future tasks for advancing K-Culture export statistics.

According to the conference materials, the key points of the discussion were: separating the export statistics for products and services in the content and arts sectors; establishing export statistics based on administrative data; building integrated statistics for products and services; creating exclusive classification systems; and developing data governance. The need to further subdivide service exports related to content and arts—such as intellectual property transactions, production services, exhibition and performance services, and advertising and marketing services—was also addressed.

The subsequent roundtable was chaired by Lee Yoonkyung, Head of the Content Research Division at the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute. Representatives from affiliated organizations—including the Arts Management Support Center, Korean Film Council, Korea Foundation for International Cultural Exchange, Bank of Korea, Korea Copyright Commission, Publication Industry Promotion Agency of Korea, and Korea Creative Content Agency—along with officials from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, discussed strategies for collecting, linking, and utilizing export data in the cultural arts and content sectors, as well as cooperation for developing statistical indicators.

Director Lee Yoonkyung said, "Since its inception in 2020, the Hallyu Economy Research Forum has served as a platform for information sharing and cooperation among the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and related organizations, and I hope it will continue to do so by enabling us to jointly analyze content export data."

President Hwang Kyoik of the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute stated, "As Korea's status as a soft power powerhouse led by K-Culture continues to rise, the advancement of export statistics is a key foundation supporting export competitiveness," adding, "I hope today's discussions will help further strengthen the industry's capacity to produce high-quality information."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.