Sharing Korea’s Cultural Policy Direction at the G20 Culture Ministers’ Meeting

On Friday, November 8, Yong Ho-seong, 1st Vice Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST), will attend the G20 Culture Ministers’ Meeting in Salvador, Brazil, and introduce Korea’s major cultural policy directions. Through bilateral meetings with Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member countries, Vice Minister Yong plans to request support for the APEC High-level Meeting on Culture, which will be held on the occasion of the APEC Summit in Gyeongju next year.

This meeting will be attended by culture ministers from G20 member countries and invited countries, and representatives from major international organizations such as UNESCO and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). They will share policies and discuss cooperation measures on topics such as ▴cultural diversity and social inclusion, ▴copyright norms in the digital environment including artificial intelligence (AI), ▴cultural creative industries and sustainable development, and ▴cultural heritage preservation and promotion. The results of the discussions will be adopted as a joint declaration under the chairmanship of Brazil.

In his speech as the chief representative, Vice Minister Yong Ho-seong shared best practices in Korea’s major cultural policies, such as ▴ policy support for maintaining cultural diversity, which is the source of cultural creativity, and promoting cultural and arts education, ▴ establishing copyright standards to protect creators’ rights in AI and the digital environment, and ▴ supporting content policy financing and cultural technology development, and emphasized the importance of culture for solidarity and cooperation.

In addition, on the occasion of attending the conference, we discussed ways to strengthen cultural cooperation through bilateral meetings with culture ministers and deputy ministers and UNESCO officials from various countries, including Indonesia, Brazil, Spain, Canada, the United States, Singapore, and Australia, and requested support and participation in the APEC high-level meeting on culture.

In addition, Vice Minister Yong signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on cultural cooperation between Korea and Brazil with Brazilian Minister of Culture Margaret Menezes on November 6. This MOU is the first new agreement in 58 years since the 1966 Cultural Agreement, and it lays the foundation for cultural cooperation between the two countries by specifying specific areas of cooperation such as cultural policy, creative economy, performing and visual arts, cultural heritage, and audiovisual industry, and adds meaning to the 65th anniversary of diplomatic relations.

Editor. Hong Se-yeong