Woo Sang-ho pitches for national funding, seeks 1 billion won for Pocheon–Cheorwon Expressway

【Financial News | Chuncheon = Kim Gi-seop】Woo Sang-ho, governor of Gangwon State, met one after another with key budget officials at the National Assembly and the government, asking them to restore funding for pending projects omitted from the government’s budget proposal.
Gangwon State said on the 11th that Woo met that day at the National Assembly with Minister of Planning and Budget Park Hong-keun, National Assembly Budget and Accounts Committee Chair Lee Kwang-jae, and Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) Policy Committee Chair Kwon Chil-seung, in turn, to request additional national funding for next year.
The most notable request concerned Kangwon National University (KNU). Woo told Minister Park that KNU had been left out this year of the “Make 10 Seoul National Universities” program, which provides 50 billion won to each university, and conveyed KNU’s request to increase the number of universities selected next year from two to three. The university believes it would be difficult to be selected if only two are chosen. Minister Park replied that it would help to consult fully with the Ministry of Education as well.
A 1-billion-won request for construction of the Pocheon–Cheorwon Expressway was also included on the list. With the announcement of the preliminary feasibility study results imminent, the idea is that securing the funding in advance would allow the project to move ahead quickly once it passes the study. Woo asked the Ministry of Planning and Budget to respond positively so the funding could be included during the Budget and Accounts Committee’s deliberations, given that the projects do not involve large sums. Minister Park said the relevant department would give the matter careful consideration at the committee stage.
Among the governor’s pledge projects, he proposed establishing a high-power quality reliability evaluation system linked to GS’s artificial intelligence (AI) data center in Donghae City (2.8 billion won), building an integrated public transportation system for Gangwon (5.1 billion won), and commissioning an integrated feasibility study for a clean-energy highway in Gangwon (500 million won).
In the medical and bio sectors, he proposed an AI Transformation Project outside the four major regions (3.2 billion won), the establishment of a Natural Products Industrialization Innovation Center in Gangneung (240 million won), and the development of a test bed for antibody drug process development and validation (1.05 billion won). Lee Kwang-jae, chair of the Budget and Accounts Committee, responded that these issues had been discussed in depth at the party-government budget policy consultation last September and that he would work to ensure the necessary national funding was included.
Woo Sang-ho said, “Every one of these projects—from the Pocheon–Cheorwon Expressway and AI data centers to bio and the development of KNU—is tied to Gangwon’s growth engines,” adding, “I’ll keep pushing until funding omitted from the government’s proposal can be restored during the National Assembly’s deliberations.”

[email protected] Kim Gi-seop Reporter