JeongSeon Forum 2020

Professor Kyoung-duk SEO is a PR specialist in promoting the Korean culture and history worldwide. Currently as professor of the general education at SungShin Women’s University, he served as a member of the Presidential Council on National Branding and Seoul City Branding Committee, Director of the Sejong Institute Foundation of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and the first principal of Dokdo School of the Independence Hall of Korea. Recently, he has been working as an ambassador of the KIA Recovery & Identification of the Ministry of National Defense as well.

Cook-jong Lee completed Ph.D. at the Ajou University College of Medicine and, then, was specially trained at Micro Surgical Institute at the San Diego Scripps Mercy Hospital at La Jolla, and at the Trauma Center of the UC San Diego Medical Center in 2003. He served as professor at the Ajou University College of Medicine between 2002 and 2019 and worked at the Royal London Hospital from 2007 to 2008. In 2020, he was re-appointed as head of the Trauma Center at the Ajou University. The ministry of public health and welfare gave Mr. Lee a prize in acknowledging his efforts to enhance national urgent medical system in 2020. In 2011, he was awarded several prizes in recognition of his contribution to national trauma treatment system. Also, between 2009 and 2010, he received a plaque of appreciation from the white house for his great supports to the US forces and public stationed in Korea.

Kim Jong-woo has produced non-fiction programs and documentaries. In February 2020, he produced 'Meeting You', a story about a mother who meets her deceased daughter in VR, to show how new technology can be combined with human emotions. He is extremely interested in how to tell the story of the conditions of life of ordinary people in a new way.

Chung Hae Kang is a former Civil Rights Commissioner, National Environmental Dispute Resolution Commissioner, Director of the Women News, environmental partner lawyer at Lee&Ko. She currently works as a Law Professor at University of Seoul since 2005. She has written on commercial law, international transaction law and environmental law. She has a special interest in the legal frame model which can support the community and civil citizenship. Also, she is involved in several citizen groups to be concerned in making ecological park including the National Yongsan Park.

Jared Diamond is an American geographer, historian, anthropologist, ornithologist, and author best known for his popular science books The Third Chimpanzee (1991); Guns, Germs, and Steel (1997, awarded a Pulitzer Prize); Collapse (2005), The World Until Yesterday (2012), and Upheaval (2019). Originally trained in biochemistry and physiology, he is known for drawing from a variety of fields, including anthropology, ecology, geography, and evolutionary biology. He is a professor of geography at UCLA. In 2005, Diamond was ranked ninth on a poll by Prospect and Foreign Policy of the world's top 100 public intellectuals.

Helena Norberg-Hodge is founder and director of Local Futures, previously known as the International Society for Ecology and Culture (ISEC). Local Futures is a non-profit organization "dedicated to the revitalization of cultural and biological diversity, and the strengthening of local communities and economies worldwide." Norberg-Hodge is the author of the international best-selling book Ancient Futures (1991), about tradition and change in the Himalayan region of Ladakh. She is also the author of Local is Our Future (2019), in which she advocates for localized alternatives to the global economy, particularly involving the creation of robust local food systems and democratic structures that can effectively resist authoritarianism. An outspoken critic of economic globalization, she co-founded – along with Jerry Mander, Doug Tompkins, Vandana Shiva, Martin Khor and others – the International Forum on Globalization (IFG) in 1994. She is a leading proponent of localization as an antidote to the problems arising from globalization and founded the International Alliance for Localization (IAL) in 2014. Norberg-Hodge produced and co-directed the award-winning documentary film The Economics of Happiness (2011), which lays out her arguments against economic globalization and for localization. In 1986, she was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for "preserving the traditional culture and values of Ladakh against the onslaught of tourism and development." In 2012, she received the Goi Peace Award for "her pioneering work in the localization movement".

Tae-hyun Park, professor of the Environment Law at the Kangwon National University School of Law, served as a lawyer in an environmental civic group. Currently, he has researched the Earth Jurisprudence and rights of the nature that view the legal system in geocentric perspective beyond human-centered environmental law. He has also run education programs such as lectures on the earth jurisprudence with his colleagues. In the meantime, he has interests in preserving, creating, and maintaining Commons, thus, he has engaged in researches on Commons-based citizen’s dividend as a mean to contribute to the maintenance of community in a capitalistic way.

Hye-jin Jung had worked as a journalist for 15 years before entering the world of law. The last 5 years of which she had intensively reported on environmental issues such as energy transition, climate change, and sustainable cities. The experiences which she had had as a environmental journalist lead me to study environmental law. She studied environmental law at Kangwon Law School under the supervision of Prof. Tae-hyun Park. She participated in Academic Society on Earth Jurisprudence in 2013, when it started, with ex Minister of Justice Kum-sil Kang, Prof. Tae-hyun Park and a few other lawyers. As the coordinator of the Academy and then one of the directors of Earth Jurisprudence Center(the Academy became the Center), She has managed Earth Jurisprudence Lecture Series, a 4-times a year, for last 5 years.

Tae-sun KANG is president of BYN BlackYak Co., LTD and serves as president of the Korea Scout Association, vice-president of the Korea Student Alpine Federation, chair of the Seoul Alpine Federation, and vice-chair of the Seoul Sports Council-Korea Sport Leader. Celebrating its 47th anniversary, BYN BlackYak became a global brand making inroads into 28 nations on 3 continents. In addition, in 2014, the company acquired the brand NAU established by product developers from NIKE and PATAGONIA in seeking for employing eco-friendly materials to make desirable products in style and function. In doing so, the company has been known to take social and environmental responsibilities. Also, BYN BlackYak has become a single brand to receive most awards around the world after receiving 19 prizes in ISPO awards. BYN BlackYak has initiated ‘BlackYak’s Kubqi Desert Ecosystem Building Project for Yellow Dust Shield’, ‘Clean Mountain 365’ to collect garbage in mountains while climbing along with BlackYak Alpine Club, and Korea’s 100 top mountains project. All these activities were conducted as part of the brands’ efforts to achieve SDGs by taking social responsibility and communicating with the public. The company received Baekmajang(the order of sport merit) in 2004, cultural awards from the Seoul Metropolitan Government in 2007, Moranjang(a national medal) in 2012, HDI Human Management Grand Prize in 2019.

Un-ho JO is CEO of Hitejinro Beverage Co., LTD, an affiliate of Hitejinro Co., LTD, one of the largest liquor companies in Korea. After working at a bank for some period, he joined Woongjin Group in 1990. Since then, in just 9 years after joining the company, he became CEO of the Woongjin Food at his age 37, the youngest one at that time. He was in charge of beverage business as a new business within the group, and under his leadership, the group developed and launched more than 6 most popular products that have helped the company gaine more than KRW 20 billion. Among representative products are Morning Rice, Green Plum, Barley Tea, and Black Barley. What makes those hit brands special is that they are made of ingredients domestically produced. Especially, Morning Rice is rice-based beverage that has become one of the most popular beverages in Vietnam. Black Barley, the world’s first ever beverage made of black barely, has become the first Korean beverage to be put on shelves of ‘Trader joe’s’, a specialized distribution channel in organic foods in the US, which has promoted Korean beverages on the global market. In 2005, he received the award ‘ CEOs who promotes Korea’s National Images’ given by the Seoul National University Industry-Academic Cooperation Foundation. Also, he was awarded the Prime minister's citation in recognition of his dedication to invigorating the Korea’s Domestic Agricultural Products Processing Industry. Additionally, he wrote an essay on business management ‘If No One Does, I Do.’

Graduating from the School of Business at Yonsei University, Kyoo-bok CHOE, president & CEO of Yuhan-Kimberly, joined the company’s marketing division in 1983. Since then, he continued his career in the company while working as senior vice president and executive vice president of the Baby Product and New Business Division, and head of the Baby Product Business of Kimberly-Clark in North Asia. Currently, he has served as president & CEO of Yuhan Kimberly, co-chair of Future Forum and Woods of Lives, and executive director of the UN Global Compact Korea Network and Woods of Peace. With his contribution, Yuhan Kimberly has become one of companies that have long been engaged in activities regarding CSR and CSY to achieve SDGs. Yuhan Kimberly was selected as the best business in promoting social values by the Korea Management Association Consultants Inc., in 2019, and received the order of merit (Dongbaekjang) in 2012 in recognition of the company’s family-friendly management(celebrating the day of population), and was awarded HDI Human Management Awards for the company’s social responsibilities(HDI Human Development Institute). Meanwhile, Yuhan Kimberly is renowned as one of the most respected businesses in Korea.

Amb. Park Suk-bum is the third UN Global Compact Network Korea Secretary General. He is in charge of enhancing businesses’ participation in promoting corporate citizenship and providing practical engagement measures. He aspires to align their operations and strategies through ten universally accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption. Established in 2000, the UN Global Compact is the largest corporate citizenship and sustainability initiative in the world with 160 nations and 14.000 corporate & organization participants. Prior to joining GCNK, Amb. Park has served as Ambassador to Iraq, Bangladesh and Korean Consul General in Houston, USA. as well as an adjunct professor at Far East University. In addition, he has served as a counselor at the Korean Delegation to OECD Korea, Minister of Korean Delegation to the EU, Director General of International Economic Bureau of MOFA and Deputy Head of Negotiation for Korea-USA FTA. Park has MBA from the University of Houston, USA and Master’s degree in International Relations from Institut International d'Administration Publique (IIAP).

Born in Andong, Gyeongsangbukdo, Korea, Ho-chul LEE obtained MA in the Ecology Landscape at the Seoul National University in 2011. He developed an alternative fuel to fossil fuel with used coffee grounds and conducted studies on quantification of impact of reducing greenhouse gases. Based on his development projects and studies, he founded a company, 4EN Inc., that has generated sustainable environmental values. The company received an award at the ‘H-OnDream Social Enterprise Start-Up Contest’ and won the Social Achievement Incentive funded by the SK group, which helped the company garner attention from the industry as a specialized company in responding to climate change. Mr. Lee was successful in getting approval from the UN for Solid Fuel CDM business in Myanmar in April 2020. He is also serving as an external judge of CDM professional in the Korea Foundation for Quality and was awarded by president of the Korea Social Enterprise Promotion Agency in May 2019.

H. E. Simon Smith is the British Ambassador to the Republic of Korea. Earlier in his career he served in Tokyo and Moscow. More recently he served as British Ambassador in Vienna (including as UK Perm Rep to the UN) and Kyiv. Ambassador Smith has held several senior roles within the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, including Director, Russia, South Caucasus, and Central Asia. A graduate of Oxford University, he speaks German, Russian, French, Japanese, Korean, and Ukrainian.