Budget ministry turns to AI to help steer fiscal planning

Minister of Planning and Budget Park Hong-keun / Yonhap

By Lee Kyung-min

• Published Apr 30, 2026 4:18 PM KST

Korea is moving to hand a portion of its fiscal planning to artificial intelligence (AI), betting that algorithms can sift through decades of data faster — and perhaps more rigorously — than overworked civil servants.

The Ministry of Planning and Budget said Friday it will introduce an “AI budget assistant” to support nearly every stage of fiscal planning, from drafting proposals to restructuring expenditures, with full deployment targeted for May 2027.

The initiative was discussed at a government meeting, where participants agreed that the system is intended to make the ministry a “first mover” in adopting AI across government operations.

The tool will rely on a large language model trained on accumulated fiscal data, including budget requests, program descriptions, statistical records and internal reviews. Officials said the system will generate tailored responses when staff input queries, dramatically reducing the time needed to gather and analyze information.

The ministry has sharply expanded its broader AI spending to support such efforts, tripling the national AI budget to 9.9 trillion won ($6.7 billion) for 2026 from 3.3 trillion won a year earlier.

Officials said the shift could ease the workload of staff who often spend long hours cross-checking past spending patterns and identifying overlaps among programs.

To prepare, the ministry plans to consolidate scattered data from personal computers, internal messaging systems and file servers into a unified platform. It will also convert government documents into AI-readable formats, moving away from legacy file systems.

An official involved in the project said the system could allow employees to quickly analyze up to a decade of fiscal data, improving both speed and precision in budget decisions.

The ministry said the government aims to accelerate adoption.

“We will introduce the AI budget assistant as early as possible to maximize both accuracy and efficiency in fiscal management,” it said.

This article was published with the assistance of generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.