Production at inter-Korean industrial park rises 36 pct in 2008

SEOUL, Feb. 8 (Yonhap) -- South Korean firms operating at an inter-Korean
industrial complex just north of the heavily armed border saw a 36 percent rise
in production last year from a year earlier, the South's government said Sunday.
Production at the Kaesong Industrial Complex, the first manufacturing venture
combining South Korean capital with North Korean labor, stood at US$251.4 million
in 2008, compared with $184.7 million in 2007, the Ministry of Unification said
in a report.
Exports produced at the complex fell 10 percent, however, to $35.8 million last
year, the ministry said.
As of the end of 2008, there were 93 South Korean factories employing about
35,000 North Korean workers in the production of labor-intensive goods, such as
textiles, kitchen wares and cosmetic cases, the ministry's data showed.
Since Dec. 1 last year, the North has restricted border crossings and expelled
some South Koreans from the industrial complex as part of retaliatory steps
against Seoul's hard-line North Korea policy.
The data suggests that despite these moves firms operating at the factory complex
apparently shrugged off frosty inter-Korean ties.
In December last year, the value of production at the complex rose 15 percent
from the same period a year earlier to $22.2 million, according to the data.
The cumulative value of production at the inter-Korean factory complex, which
began operations in 2005, stood at $524.8 million by the end of 2008, the
ministry said.
(END)