Some ministries will have new English names

By Kim Se-jeong

The government plans to change the English names of some government ministries and agencies that sound strange or puzzling to foreigners.

The Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs is spearheading the effort, with the help of a 12-man advisory committee.

“A consensus was there within the government that there’s no rule on how to name government agencies and ministries in English and that’s how we started this,” a ministry official said, adding that the panel, which was formed in December, is also reviewing the names of civil servant positions.

The committee will meet on Friday to draw up a list of ministries and agencies with ambiguous English names and make recommendations. The ministry will then consult with the ministries, according to the official.

The Ministry of Strategy and Finance tops the list for a new name, among 17 ministries.

“I was confused at first,” one European diplomat said. “It is the Ministry of Finance in other countries. The word ‘strategy’ has no meaning here.”

The Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning is another. “It’s not clear enough to me,” the diplomat said. “With science, you think university. When it comes to ICT, you think about computers and telecommunication. And future planning should be the economy. It’s not clear-cut. Names should be simple, like the Ministry of Education.”

Mesfin Midekssa, a diplomat from Ethiopia, said: “I was always wondering about the name ‘future planning.’ You plan the future always, not the past.”

The problem has existed before. The Ministry of Knowledge Economy under former President Lee Myung-bak caused the same confusion, according to the European diplomat.

The official said the committee would publish guidelines on how to name executive bodies in English. “Our goal is to make the names easy and accurate,” she said.

Not all ministries and agencies welcome the initiative. The official said some organizations were concerned that a sudden name change could cause confusion, especially in international cooperation.

Many see the problem as being that presidents, when elected, can shake up whole executive bodies. The European diplomat acknowledged that. “In Korea, when the new leader comes, everything changes again,” he said.

The Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning did not exist. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade became the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after Park Geun-hye took office and that prompted debate over whether it was time for Korea to have fixed ministries. “That will be very helpful for me,” Midekssa said.