JEJU-DO < invest Korea

According to Yonhap News,

(SEOUL=Yonhap News) Foreigners own more than 1 percent of South Korea's southernmost resort island of Jeju, with Chinese investors holding the majority, data showed Monday.

As of end-June, foreign ownership of land on Jeju came to 20.78 square kilometers, or 1.12 percent of the island's total land area of 1,849 square kilometers, according to data compiled by the Jeju provincial government.

The percentage was up sharply from 0.9 percent posted three months earlier.

The jump in foreign land ownership on Jeju was attributed to foreign investors' growing interest in the island's resort facilities and its projects to build large-scale tourism complexes.

In April alone, a foreign company based in the British Virgin Islands bought a 3.2-square-kilometer tourism complex in the island's capital of Jeju City, sharply raising the area of foreign land ownership on Jeju.

By nationality, Chinese investors account for the largest 41.6 percent portion of the land owned by foreigners, followed by U.S. and Japanese nationals with 19.9 percent and 11.5 percent each.

The data shows Jeju has attracted keen interest from Chinese investors as a promising investment destination, said a city government official, adding that more than 90 percent of properties owned by Chinese are large-scale tourism complexes, golf courses and other resort facilities.

Jeju is South Korea's most famous tourist attraction, with more than 12 million tourists visiting the island per year.

yjkim8826@yna.co.kr

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