Gyeongsangnam-do Issues "Rebuttal" to Criticism Over Recommending One County for Rural Basic Income Pilot Project Call for Proposals

Gyeongsangnam-do has responded to criticism from local political circles and others, who called it an “abuse of power” for recommending only Sancheong County for next year’s rural basic income pilot project call for proposals.

“Before applying to the call for proposals, we asked the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs on September 18 whether we could decide which counties to submit applications for, taking provincial funding conditions into account. We were told that we could choose the counties to submit,” Gyeongsangnam-do said. “Taking the project’s sustainability and fiscal conditions into consideration, we decided to submit one county for this call for proposals.”

It added, “We formed a review committee of seven outside experts, including university professors and research fellows at research institutes, and evaluated all nine counties using the same criteria, in line with the ministry’s evaluation standards for the call for proposals. We conducted a comprehensive evaluation based on 12 indicators across six categories, including policy need and the adequacy of project plans, and submitted Sancheong County’s application, which received the highest score.”

Gyeongsangnam-do Provincial Government. [Photo by Lee Seryeong]

The province rebutted the criticism, saying, “We selected the county to apply for the call for proposals within the province’s fiscal means through a fair and objective internal review. This cannot be considered an abuse of power exceeding the province’s authority and role; we selected and submitted the application in accordance with the government’s guidelines for the call for proposals.”

It added, “If the pilot project becomes a permanent program under the current cost-sharing ratio of 50% from the national government and 50% from local governments, our province’s financial burden for the 10 counties in the province would reach KRW 190 billion. It would be difficult for the province to continue shouldering project costs of KRW 190 billion every year.”

It explained, “We cited KRW 190 billion to emphasize that the national government’s share of the costs must increase for the basic income project to be sustainable.”

It also said, “The government plans to expand the areas covered by the basic income pilot project in 2027 from the current 17 counties to 35. Those 35 counties would make up half of the 69 counties designated as areas at risk of population decline and eligible for the pilot project. By simple calculation, it is therefore reasonable to assume that five of the 10 counties in our province could be selected.”

It added, “We would have to provide KRW 95 billion in provincial funding for the counties added alongside Namhae County, which is already participating. Given our current fiscal conditions, it would be difficult to cover KRW 95 billion. Even if just one more county were selected, Namhae County and Gyeongsangnam-do would have to contribute KRW 32.7 billion.”

The province rebutted the criticism, saying, “We recommended counties selectively, within the range of funds available for support. The claims that we arbitrarily restricted eligible applicants, blocked counties from applying based on our own criteria that are not included in the government’s standards, or used an unreasonable argument based on the assumption that all nine counties would be selected are unfounded.”

Earlier, Gyeongsangnam-do announced that it had recommended only Sancheong County for the 2027 rural basic income pilot project call for proposals, taking into account the need for the project, the fiscal constraints of supporting all 18 cities and counties, and the potential impact on other support programs for provincial residents.

In response, the Gyeongsangnam-do chapter of the Progressive Party issued a statement and held a press conference, criticizing the province: “Excluding eight counties from the government recommendation under the guise of an internal review is an abuse of authority that uses administrative power to infringe on local governments’ opportunities to participate in the call for proposals.”

The Gyeongsangnam-do chapter of the Democratic Party of Korea also condemned the decision, saying, “This is an unreasonable argument that assumes all nine counties will be selected even though no decision has been made, and it is laughable. The call for proposals’ guidelines do not state that applicants can be arbitrarily restricted or applications discarded through an internal review.”

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