KT&G Marks 20 Years of Partnership with Tobacco Farmers Through Volunteer Program
Around 20 employees volunteered to harvest leaf tobacco at farms in Gimje, Jeonbuk-do, KT&G raises purchase prices for domestically grown leaf tobacco and provides around KRW 400 million for growers’ health checkups and other support
사진설명
On July 2, KT&G employees volunteered to harvest leaf tobacco in Gimje, Jeonbuk-do, to help farmers struggling with labor shortages. The employees took a commemorative photo after the volunteer work.
사진설명
On July 2, KT&G employees volunteered to harvest leaf tobacco in Gimje, Jeonbuk-do, to help farmers struggling with labor shortages. The photo shows a KT&G employee harvesting tobacco together with a farmer.
사진설명
On July 2, KT&G employees volunteered to harvest leaf tobacco in Gimje, Jeonbuk-do, to help farmers struggling with labor shortages. The photo shows KT&G employees with their harvest.
On July 2, KT&G (CEO Bang Kyung-man) carried out a tobacco harvesting volunteer program to help leaf tobacco farmers facing labor shortages during the harvest season.
About 20 KT&G employees volunteered at tobacco farms in Bongnam-myeon, Gimje, Jeonbuk-do, helping farmers harvest their crops. Farming communities across Korea are struggling to secure workers amid the continued decline and aging of the rural population.
Leaf tobacco farming, which takes place in midsummer, is particularly labor-intensive as mechanization is difficult and most work is done by hand. Against this backdrop, KT&G has sent employee volunteers to tobacco farms every year since 2007, continuing the initiative for two decades. In addition to helping transplant leaf tobacco seedlings in the spring, the company also lends a hand during harvest, pursuing year-round mutual growth with farmers.
KT&G has also steadily carried out support programs to improve the welfare of domestic tobacco growers. In May, the company delivered KRW 400 million in welfare support funds to cover health checkups for tobacco growers and scholarships for their children. From 2013 through this year, a cumulative total of approximately 16,500 growers and their family members have benefited from the program.
In May, KT&G also decided to raise the purchase price of domestically grown leaf tobacco to help ease the burden on farmers caused by rising fuel and labor costs. As a result, the company’s total spending on leaf tobacco purchases is expected to increase by approximately KRW 2.2 billion from last year.
Jeong Seong-heon, Director of KT&G Purchasing Operations Headquarters, said, “For 20 years, we have volunteered to transplant seedlings and harvest leaf tobacco to support farms struggling with labor shortages caused by the decline and aging of the rural population. In addition to our volunteer activities, we will continue providing various forms of support to grow together with farming communities.”