The development of overseas resources can not only supply the minerals that are not produced domestically but also bring profits by direct investment. However, the development of overseas resources requires significant amounts of fund and would take a long time to receive returns. In addition, investment would face the problems such as low rate of success, the resources nationalism of developing countries, and the reactions of environmentalists in advanced countries.
The nations consuming the resources, both the developing countries and the developed countries, are making great efforts to secure the resources affected by the two oil crises that occurred in the 1970's. The acceleration of the development of overseas resources arose from the notion that Korea, which relies on imports of principal energy and necessary minerals and needs lots of resources, must secure these resources to insure future national economic growth.
The Ministry of commerce, Industry and Energy (MOCIE, ex Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy) began to development of overseas resources in January, 1978 and the department of overseas resources was made by the Korea Resources Corporation (KORES, ex Korea Petroleum Development Corporation) was established to be in charge of the explorations and developments of oversea oil fields in December, 1978.
The full-scale developments of overseas resources began under ¡®the law of developments of overseas resources promotion' which was passed in December 5, 1978 to support these developments, and the funds in the developments of these overseas resources was created to back up the needed expenses. The developments of oil fields was accelerated by the introduction of a success-controlled loan system in December, 1983.
The government renamed ¡®the law of developments of overseas resources promotion' to ¡®the law of overseas resources development projects' in December, 1982 to execute these developments with more efficiency. Also, the government revised the law to include farm products, marine products, forest products and livestock as overseas resources in addition to energy and minerals.
In January, 1983, the law mentioned in the above paragraph was again revised to let the national organizations and the self-governing bodies purchase the developed overseas resources preferentially. Additional revisions were made in 1988, 1994 and 1997. This law was extended to the extent of classifying the methods of developing overseas resources and the objects to be allowed to purchase developed overseas resources preferentially.
Korea government established the basic plan for overseas resources development and selected the eight most important strategic minerals based on the scale of their import and their significance to the national industries in February 2001. The eight strategic minerals include Petroleum, Gas, Bituminous coal, Uranium, Iron, Copper, Zinc, and Rare earth. Based on actual self-reliant development records, these minerals were grouped into two categories: the Petroleum and Gas group and the Bituminous coal and mineral resources group. These two groups were assigned their respective targets for self-reliant development as well as priority tasks. In 1990, the government has established the policy of overseeing the projects of overseas resources more actively to secure the energy and industrial minerals, which are mostly imported from the other counties. This is due to the increasing of uncertainty of international resources markets. Accordingly, Korea has invested U$1.67 billion for 153 projects except petroleum and gas until May 2003.
Before IMF economic crisis in Korean, the development of overseas resources in the private sector was executed actively. These were influenced by the expansion of the overseas investment capacity and by the opening of former eastern countries. But since IMF in 1997, the investment by the private enterprises was stagnant because of the corporate restructuring and safe management.
In order to strengthen the measures of resources diplomacy, the Join Committee for Resources Cooperation was made to promote such things as trading with other countries holding rich resources, joint ventures, techniques exchange, and information exchange between governments. The committee of resources cooperation was founded and in operation with 7 countries such as Australia, Indonesia, Philippines, Russia, Mongolia, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam. |
Coal 
