 LIDC president |
Lippo Incheon Development (LIDC) is hoping Midan City, its leisure and tourism-oriented project in Yeongjong Island, Incheon, will attract foreign investment, as well as millions of Chinese and Japanese tourists.
Midan City, also known as Woonbook, is being designed as an “all-in-one-city” with shopping malls, resort hotels, medical facilities, a golf “village,” entertainment zone, residential area, a Chinese cultural village and an international school.
But for the project to pique the interest of investors and tourists, LIDC President Joseph S. Chiang said the Korean government should consider giving residency to foreign investors and visa-free access for tourists to Yeongjong Island, similar to that for Jeju Island.
“The government spent a lot of money and effort creating laws, regulations and tax incentives to attract foreign investments in the last 10 years but this does not seem to have been successful. The best way is as they did on Jeju, where foreign investors that invest can receive permanent residency in Jeju... We feel the quickest way to attract foreign investment is to apply the same law to other free economic zones, so that Chinese and other investors will come,” Chiang told The Korea Times at his office in downtown Seoul, last week.
Jeju gives residency to foreigners who invest more than $500,000 or 5.9 billion won in real estate, and offers visa-free entry for 30 days to tourists from all countries, except 11 countries such as Afghanistan, Iran and Libya. This has proven to be successful in luring Chinese investors and tourists.
Chiang said creating a visa-free zone in Yeongjong Island will entice investors to come and invest in the area. “Either you go through a very long and expensive process to make a law to encourage foreigners to come here or just want to make a quick simple fix like making it a visa-free area, the government has to make a decision,” he said.
While he admitted the government may be wary of giving a visa waiver to tourists because of illegal immigration, Chiang said the government should consider the benefits of getting tourists in the area.
Yeongjong Island, part of the Incheon Free Economic Zone, is a mere 10 minutes away from the Incheon International Airport, and is connected to Incheon by two bridges.
Chiang noted Incheon International Airport is seeking to handle 100 million passengers annually by 2015, which may create congestion problems at the airport. Allowing transit passengers to enter Yeongjong Island without a visa will ease congestion and bring more tourists to the city.
“The government is having difficulty in getting the Yeongjong project moving. (Visa-free entry) would solve this and other problems. They wouldn’t have to worry because foreigners will come... If you have at least three million transit passengers that will go out and spend $100 in Yeongjong Island, that’s $300 million in revenue,” he said.
Chiang said LIDC has designed Midan City with facilities that will attract its target market of Chinese and Japanese tourists, as well as domestic tourists.
“We know our customers, so we designed a city to attract them,” he said.
Chiang said there will be an international hospital and other facilities, where tourists can come for health, medical check-up and cosmetic surgery package tours. There is already interest from China’s three largest travel agencies in these future package tours.
Other planned projects in Midan City include an entertainment shopping mall, a golf course, a Korean American village and a Chinese cultural village. Basic infrastructure in Midan City will be finished by the end of November, and the entire project is expected to be completed by 2017.
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