By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
All alcoholic product packing will be required to contain the geographical locations of the ingredients starting in July, government officials said Wednesday.
Also, regional makers of traditional liquor, such as "makgeolli," will be allowed to sell their products over the Internet, as policymakers look to provide farming communities extra income sources and foster the local beverages into a ``national'' products to complement kimchi.
The current Law on Liquor Tax and Sales requires the local makers of alcoholic beverages to unveil the type of drink, name and proportion of the ingredients, date of production and use-by-dates on labels.
After the new law kicks in from July, which involves all alcoholic drinks including beer, wine, soju and makgeolli, beverage makers will have to add information about the countries and region of where the main ingredients came from, the Ministry of Strategy and Finance said. However, the rules will not be imposed on imported drinks.
Government officials believe that the strengthened rules regarding product origin will help enhance the reputation of regional foods and pressure beverage makers to upgrade the quality of their products and prevent them from misleading consumers with ``non-genuine'' products.
However, companies say that the new regulations will inevitably lead to higher prices on the shelves, as consumers are likely to flock to the bottles containing higher proportions of local ingredients.
In the midst of the makgeolli boom, there has been sarcasm that the suddenly-popular traditional beverages mostly aren't Korean at all, with most makers relying on ingredients from China and other countries to keep costs low.
Most of the makgeolli products available in local markets rely entirely on foreign ingredients, while the makers of soju, Korea's traditional distilled drink, import about 50 percent of their ingredients from other countries. About 20 to 30 percent of the ingredients in local beer are also imported.
The current law bans the online sale of liquor, although certain traditional beverages, a frequent choice for holiday gifts here, are allowed to be sold and moved by the country's mail service.
From next month, however, the government will allow ``limited'' sales of traditional beverages on the Internet, making them available on the Web sites of the Korea Agro-Fisheries Trade Corporation (www.eatmart.co.kr), Korea Post (mall.epost.go.kr) and also the individuals or manufacturers' associations responsible for making the goods.
The Web sites will be required to provide a verification process to prevent underage buyers from purchasing the products. The online buyers will be banned from buying more than 50 bottles at once.
However, liquor made by companies won't be allowed to be sold on the Internet, as the government is only supporting individual farmers and regional agricultural associations making the drinks from their own produce.
After being overshadowed by Western drinks such as whiskey and wine in previous years, traditional beverages are suddenly experiencing a renaissance, with makgeolli, the cloudy peasant wine made from rice and other ingredients, contributing to the big jolt.
thkim@koreatimes.co.kr
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