JEJU-DO < invest Korea

Jeju is an isolated island at which the northern and southern distributional limits meet. As a result, the island is known to host more than 9,000 species of land and marine organisms, including animals, insects, plants, and seaweed.

The island features a unique environment where a number of previously unknown species have been discovered.

In particular, the island hosts a variety of flora, including plants which have spread south from the continent, plants differentiated from those in Taiwan or Japan, and warm temperature plants, and the island features a high diversity of species relative to its size. Halla Mountain is famous for its vertical ecosystem of plants, including subtropical plants, temperate zone plants, and polar plants. Currently, 2,001 species of plants are known to inhabit the mountain.

In recognition of the academic value of its biodiversity, Jeju Island was designated a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2002.

Gotjawal(1), the only forest in the world in which tropical northern limit plants and polar southern plants coexist, is full of evergreen trees even in winter, serving as the lungs of the ecosystem and playing an important role in keeping underground water clean. In a word, Gotjawal is a pillar of the island’s biodiversity.

Being an ideal location for biodiversity research, a Jeju Biodiversity Research Institute has been established which is committed to preserving biological resources and their commercialization by securing a diversity of biological genetic resources and cataloging them a database.