FIELD STUDY

Obongsan Eco-Cultural Village and Sangju Red Cross Hospital

 CONTENTS

I. Field Trip Experience

II. Lessons

III. Application to Home Country

a. Vietnam
b. Philippines
c. Myanmar
d. Korea

IV. Recommendations
PART 1: FIELD TRIP EXPERIENCE
Activities in eco-village
As the first destination, we visited “Solti” cooperative and Obongsan eco-cultural
training center. “Solti” cooperative is an eco-friendly agricultural product processing
company. The characteristic of this cooperative is operated by residents who have same
interest and common goal. We learned about the cultivation process of bean-sprout
produced without growth accelerator. This organic product help villagers increase their
income based on its high value, which is one competitiveness in agricultural industry.
Next site was “Obongsan eco-cultural training center” which is one small business
of Obongsan rural village comprehensive development project. Obongsan rural village
comprehensive development project is to develop rural area and attract people. According
to organizer’s speech, there are four main objectives to achieve: 1) Improve living
conditions, 2) Improve area landscape, 3) Increase income project, 4) Local capacity
building project.
We could find some similarities to Saemaul Undong through his explanation as
follows. 1) Cooperation tie (community spirit), 2) Group work in common workplace, 3)
Resident participation, and 4) Study tour to advanced area. First, most villagers are
alumnus and it has positive effects on successful implementation of this project by using
their sense of community. Also, they work together in common workplace which could be
found in Saemaul Undong as a characteristic. In addition, residents in this village also
participate in comprehensive project through funding, making decision, and so on. Lastly,
villagers visit advanced area regularly and learn some strong point which can be applicable
to their village.

Activities in Sangju Red Cross Hospital

As the second destination, we visited Saju Red-Cross hospital as well as Saju City
Health Clinic. Upon our arrival at the facility, we were introduced and explained by a
responsible personnel about the history of Korean Red Cross as well as Sangju-city Red Cross
Hospital, its purpose and its heath care service provided to the local people. We learnt that
the hospital was established in 1955 with the core values of humanity, impartiality, neutrality,
independence, voluntary service and unity. This Saji City clinic is the central clinic in Saju City.
We observed that its activities includes nursing care services, radiology services,
physiotherapy services, public health, health promotion program, family planning activities and
home visits care service, including 10 activities of medical services for the poor, the old, and
foreigners. We got to know the difference from other private hospitals because it was a hospital
based on NGO mode of operation. We came to know about basic medical service to the old
people and some citizens (i.e. vaccination, medical education, light prescription, etc.).
Following their presentation, we looked around vaccination room, health promotion room and
other facilities rooms inside of the hospital facility, and we started to leave.

PART 2: LESSONS LEARNED

Obongsan Eco-Cultural Village
Lesson 1: Increase elderly’s participation in community development by improving
the quality of their lives (Business opportunities, health care programs and facilities
and capacity-building and self-development programs for the elderly)
Obongsan villagers have shown to us the importance of everyone’s participation in
community development. As most of their residents are older people, they have created
job opportunities especially to those elderlies that stay mostly inside their houses. They
have also built pavilion, exercise and physical therapy rooms so they can rest well and
take care of their body better. The elders are also included in the capacity building program
which provides education about advertising and marketing techniques, consulting services,
village management supporting services, informatization to local village people. Rather
than isolating the large number of elderly, they used it to their advantage. They have been
continuously supporting them by improving the quality of their lives by giving them
opportunities for self-development, income and good health which resulted to increasing
of the elderly’s participation in community development.
Lesson 2: Local villager’s (residents) initiative to develop their area (Spirits of Self-
Help, Cooperation, and Unity among the people)
The local villagers initiated on making the vacant elementary school to be an eco-
cultural training center and proposed projects to the government that promoted their culture
and main agriculture products. They have also started income-generating projects to help
the community. Originally, the building was an elementary school but since there were no
students or any workers the school was closed. So, the people thought about and initiated
making use of it and propose a project to the government that will promote culture and
agriculture products and income generating project. Also, the villagers collectively
contribute to the funding of their projects, which increases their commitment to the
programs and projects and also holding them responsible to it. All of these shows that the
villagers are helping themselves, united and cooperative to make their village better.
Lesson 3: Making use of old-age labor and cutting down input cost
With the figure of 35 percent of 65 year old and over – people in total of population
of 5 villages, this area is considered as the old-age resident area while that area is blessed
for plentiful natural resources, especially fruit plants and agricultural products. The
question here is how to exploit and develop those natural advantages of the area effectively
without wasting idle labor resources. As we can see, small-scale workshops have been
setting up with machines are not too complicated for old people to use but operate
effectively such as bean sprouts washing machine, big vases for bean sprouts growing,
 peeling and pounding garlic machine. This can give old people job opportunities and more
interestingly, they work there with no salary but free to bring products they had contributed
to produce back home, which help cutting down input cost of products. Moreover, the fact
that all products are organic produced without chemical adding or preservative, which
helps to put the price up. As a result, the fact that input cost is cut down combine with
output price is increasing, the villagers can get more benefit and old people are happy
having work.
Lesson 4: Making dried fruit - a method to increase the value of fruit and avoid
devaluating in harvest time.
Persimmon – typical kind of fruit in Sangju area, is dried within 30 days or until 45
days with the temperature is approximately 7-8 C degree which is in autumn time – the
harvest time for persimmon. After that process complete, the persimmon becomes
sweeter and its value is raised up than fresh one, obviously no chemical adding and thus,
the price of dried one will be higher. This can bring various benefits for producers. Firstly,
higher price will help them get more turnover than selling fresh persimmon. Secondly,
dried persimmon can be sold in any time during year no matter what season is, which is
impossible with fresh one and again, villagers can avoid an urgent situation of trying to
sell fresh persimmons as many as they can in harvest time. Last but not least, income
from selling dried persimmon will improve villagers’ lives, they are no longer afraid of
throwing away those persimmons too ripe due to not being sold in crop time without
receiving any turnover and/or force to sell their products to traders with low price because
of that worry above.

Sangju Red Cross Hospital

Lesson 1: Access to Health Service for the Needy and Elderly
An aging population health needs differ from younger people. As we know, when
we age, our body becomes weaker and more fragile. Thus, makes a higher demand for
health services. Also, the general population might be underestimating old people’s true
need for these services. Their need for services can also be influenced by their ability to
pay or find such health services.
The Sangju Red Cross Hospital delivers a lot of social services for the elderly. In
particular, they visit the elderly in their houses when the elderly cannot personally come
to the hospital because of various situations. Often times, the elderly cannot visit the
hospital due to poor health and also if their houses are far from the hospital. As Sangju
city is a densely-aged population, it is very difficult for old people to mobilize themselves.
By giving these kinds of services, the needs of the elders can be addressed, and this can
help to increase the elderly’s quality of life.
Sangju Red Cross Hospital’s main objective is to extend the longevity of village
people with good health conditions. They provide health services to locals especially to
the old and the less fortunate. They even visit the houses of the old people and provide
them the needed health services. Also, they have health promotions rooms which will
encourage villagers to have a healthier lifestyle. Some of their programs are smoking
 prevention, and weight loss program. They even have vaccination and treatment rooms,
physical therapy room and a mental health center. Also, they provide health education to
people with high blood pressure, diabetes, and brain diseases which requires long-term
treatments. All of these will promote healthy lifestyle and prevent spread of diseases in
the village. Also, since the hospital is funded by the government, the poor locals can have
better health conditions without paying costly hospital bills.
Lesson 2: Help for the Foreign Working Residents
The Sangju Hospital as well delivers free health services for non-Korean workers
in the area. The Sangju Red Cross Hospital staff explained that there are a number of
foreign workers in Sangju, and not a lot of foreigners can access health services as the
price can be very hefty. As we are also foreigners living temporarily in Korea, we can
relate to this issue. First, as we cannot speak fluent Korean there are a lot of
miscommunication to accessing health services. Moreover, if we go to international clinics,
costs are notably higher especially if you don’t have insurance. So, we think that helping
foreign workers with health services are significant, as they are also residents which fuels
the local economy—in terms of consuming and productivity.

PART 3: APPLICATION TO HOME COUNTRY

1) Vietnam
Old Age labor and Minimizing Input Cost
It is essential for some Vietnamese village committees to consider and apply this
lesson into their village to make use of their own products. Apparently, urbanization is
prevalent phenomenon in developing countries and it leaves a reality that there are only
mainly old people living in villages in rural area without having jobs to do and have to live
on government subsidy or their children’s support while idle natural resources are not
exploited and developed probably. If there is a project which is required a big amount of
money in first stages to invest in purchasing machine and building small mills, I think it will
be a chance for villagers to change their village “face”. A big effort at the first stage might
be a big challenge but it will bring sustainable development for the village to make use of
old-age labor and increase income as well as develop their own villages’ products.
Value-added Process to Increase Profits
Located in tropical area, Vietnam is well-known by several kinds of tropical fruit
which are not only popular in domestic consuming but also exported to many countries
around the world. However, the fact which always existed in rural areas where
Vietnamese farmers product in small-scale within household is “depreciation and crop
failure". This can be explained by products depreciation when it is a good crop, which puts
farmers in difficult situation. The price of purchasing offered by traders even is sometimes
not enough for them to pay for seeds and fertilizer. As a result, farmers can only chose to
either sell at a really low price or using them, throw them away when they get too old. If
 villagers can gather and make investment for purchasing necessary dried-making
equipment and specific plans for the harvest, the fruit can be dried and packaged in decent
way. Thus dried fruit can be sold with a high price, which contributes to bring well-being
life for villagers.
Health Services
The Red Cross hospital has been operated as not only a hospital but also a
Nongovernmental organization with various special functions such as patient-caring
service by nurses in hospital, special service for old people and some free medical check-
up programs, ect. I would suggest those ideas for Red Cross Vietnam so that they can
apply them into their programs practically and effectively. Especially, the patient-caring
service by nurses in hospital impressed me the most. Actually today, people are putting
in busy lives without much time for even themselves, thus managing time for taking care
of their family members in working time is almost impossible and inconvenient. Therefore,
approaching patient-caring service by nurses is likely to be an optimal solution because it
can save people from wasting working time on looking after patients, then they can do
that in their free time instead. Moreover, patients are ensured being looked after by
professional and skilled careers as nurses.

2) Philippines
Re-development of rural towns
The Philippines has a rural population of over 55% (World Bank, 2015), however,
little attention is given to develop these rural cities. The rural areas still thrive of its old
ways of rearing agricultural produce, fishing, animal rearing, etc. Because of the small
income incurred through these activities, young workers go to the urbanized cities and
leave the rural areas. Thus, the decreasing workforce.
With the help of the villagers and the government, the Obongsan eco-culture village
was brought into action. Like this, the Philippine can learn about how re-development
can increase the quality of life for the residents. Also, it can prevent urbanization since
quality work is available in their hometowns. Investments for tourist attraction in the rural
area can help the residents by drawing tourist to spend money in the area and fuel
economic activity. For example, rural experience camps, farming activity experience,
crop picking, or camping sites, can be a good idea for a tourist attraction for the rural
area.
Introduction of Technology for Higher Income
The Obongsan Village has demonstrated making sustainable efforts to increase the
income of the farmers by introducing new technology. From fruit drying (persimmon) to
making organic beansprouts, their process of value adding help the residents to be able
to sell their products at higher prices. This process can be adapted in the Philippines, by
making creative value added solutions to the crops produced in a lot of rural areas. The
Philippines as a tropical country, produces a lot of crops, and if dealt with proper research
and creativity, can produce higher value added finished products.
Elderly’s participation in community development
The life span of Filipinos is now longer at 67 for males and 72 for females due to
modern technology but the quality of life, however, did not improve. Filipinos are living
longer but in poor health as the country nears a “demographic transition” that leads to
an aging population. By 2025 to 2030, the country’s population would start to age. At
present, there are around seven million Filipinos who are senior citizens, or aged 60 and
above. As of the latest figures, the elderly dependent population (aged 65 and older)
comprises 6 to 7 percent of the population; by 2025 it is expected that the elderly will be
10.25 percent of the population. The implications of this on Philippine development are
significant, specifically on social welfare dimensions. An important point in this regard is
the quality of life of the elderly. We are still a young population but on the boundary of a
demographic transition stage of an aging population. Beyond ensuring their basic
survival needs of food and health, an enabling environment should be nurtured by way
of support services and opportunities for senior citizens to continue their self-
development and to contribute to community and national development.
Community-initiated Proposal and Community Burden-Sharing
In the Philippines, the people are usually dependent to the government and are
waiting to be served better. I believe the Filipinos should become more assertive in
initiating studies, assessment and projects to improve the community rather than
waiting for the government to move. They can initiate and propose projects in the form
of assessing their area better, making use of idle houses, vacant lot, etc. to their
advantage which can result to more sustainable income-generating projects, better
infrastructure project and community development programs.
The community development programs and projects in the Philippines are fully
funded by the government. That’s why I really recommend that the Filipinos adapt the
strategy of Korea in terms of project funding - wherein the government is not solely
responsible in funding community development programs and projects. It is way better
if the funds come from the central government, local government and the villagers
because they altogether contribute to the betterment of the villages. But of course,
transparency of used funds should be implemented to avoid corruption. Though we
already contribute through the taxes, contributions to a specific project in the
community would be better. This way, the villagers will feel more involved and take
really good care of the community development projects and programs - from the start
until it is finished - as they feel more committed and responsible to them since they
contributed their own money for it – no matter how big or small their contributions are.
Health services prioritization (Better Health Care Services)
As the Philippines registered 27-28% poverty incidence (2015), access to health
care are the last on their list. Public hospitals are outnumbered by private clinics and
hospitals (which can be very expensive), thus making trips to hospital/clinics for
checkup the least of their priority. Especially, marginalized groups and vulnerable
individuals (like the elderly) are affected, deprived of information, money and access to
proper health services that would help them to prevent and treat diseases. By, taking
 consideration of these people, construction of health care centers, it can provide easy
access to these vulnerable people. Lives lost to disease and sickness, reduces
economic activity as well. A healthy population means a healthy workforce which can
fuel increased economic activity. Reducing poverty, improving nutrition, and making
sure people have safe access to water and sanitation, plus strengthening national
health systems, is the utmost significance for a developing country. Thus, this is a small
step, in reaching a greater goal for development and the quality of life for people.
Also, hospitals in the Philippines should encourage the locals to follow a healthy
lifestyle to avoid spreading of diseases and encourage a longer life span with better
health conditions. Especially in rural areas where a lot of poor people are residing. Also,
a health center/hospital which prioritizes the elders and poor people - wherein they can
also include in their program in-house health services. And lastly, provide health
education to people about high blood pressure, diabetes, and brain diseases for
prevention and also for long-term treatments.

3) Myanmar
Myanmar is traditionally an agricultural country and agriculture sector remains
as a major contributor to GDP, and its share of export earnings is about 40%. At the
same time, agriculture sector provides employment to more than 60 per cent of work
force. In rural areas where variety of crops are grown, after harvesting the crops, the
farmers have to export their raw materials to the processing factories in urban areas so
that the crops are processed until they are ready for customers. On the other hand, the
farmers have to pay for transportation costs of their crops to be able to export to urban
areas. In some areas where there are no smooth transportation systems, the farmers
don’t have direct access to export to the processing factories. In that situation, the
farmers are facing such difficulties whether they are willing to pay for more
transportation costs or the crops are going to waste.

Therefore, those challenges cause the local farmers to increase their trading
cost, to reduce their income level, and also can create food security problems of the
country in indirect ways because of wasting crops. To be able to address those
challenges, farmers need to be provided with a facility like Obongsan eco-cultural
training center where the primary products are processed at the center into finished
products and are sold at higher prices. In that case, after harvesting their crops,
farmers will have the opportunity to process their raw materials at the same place,
within the locality without covering transportation costs and wasting their crops. On the
other hand, building such training center in rural areas can provide the job opportunities
to rural people and can absorb and utilize rural labor inputs, especially the older people.

One of the things I learnt from Red-Cross Clinic is providing home visit health
care service to those who cannot come to the hospital because of difficulties in
 transportation. In rural areas of Myanmar, although there are some health care centers,
they still cannot provide adequate health services to patients. Therefore, it is very
difficult for the patients from remote areas to go to hospitals in urban areas because of
lack of transportation systems. Therefore, to provide improved access to health care
services to rural people, such kind of home visit care services is essential in Myanmar.

4) Korea
High residents’ participation

Based on Special Act on Balanced National Development, Korea Rural

Community Corporation has made a lot of efforts to develop rural area. In case of rural
comprehensive development project, they divide business into three main sector such
as 1) Income increase sector, 2) Using regional property, and 3) Basic facilities.

My hometown Ulsan, there are some project for improving townscape which is
a part of rural comprehensive development project. But, it doesn’t maintain for a long
time because of lack of follow-up management and community participation. On the
other hand, project in Hamchang-eup can be maintained after completion because they
provide opportunity of experience related with main business to villagers. Through
these opportunities, residents can learn how to manage after end of overall project.

Therefore, I think my hometown should encourage residents to participate in

development project and learn how to manage some problems after conclusion. Then,
it will contribute to reduce extra budget for repair work.

PART 4: RECOMMENDATIONS
Obongsan Eco-Cultural Village
Applying Farm-stay program
During visiting eco-village, we saw some students who want to experience how to
make tofu and enjoy making dried-persimmon. Also, there are lots of demand about new
experience in rural area. With these reasons, I want to suggest adopting “Farm-stay” as
a pull factor and source of extra income. The target group can be children, foreigners, or
family and village’s main crop can be used as contents of this program. In addition, it will
give positive influence to villagers because most people in this area are the elderly who
cannot meet their children frequently and feel loneliness. But if the villagers open their
village to others and communicate with them through this kind of program, they can
go for the effect of
go for the effect of
 killing two bird with
killing two birds with
one stone
one stone.
Proper Marketing
Marketing is very important for tourism, so they can be able to attract more tourists
in their area. We think that the villagers can collaborate with the government to help
them advertise their activities such as biking in the silk road. Or, they can conduct a
festival for bikers, or even a competition, to attract and increase visitors.
For Example:
• More advertisement materials (e.g. flyers, pamphlets, brochures)
For promotion of the places, not only for locals but also for foreign visitors.
• Additional interesting activities for visitors
We believe the area has still so much to offer so more people would be interested
to visit there. More tours around the area and its natural surrounding would be better.
• Social Media platform to promote the area
Social media such as Facebook would be of good help in promoting the place.

Sangju Red Cross Hospital

Building an Experience Center
When we visited Sangju Red Cross hospital and look around ward and some places
in hospital, we felt sorry to patients because we saw inside their space as a group. Of
course, we thought visiting ward as a group is not generic case but it is not good for all
who are in hospital. So, we think about building experience center for visitors from outside
as an alternative. Then, all people can feel free and go around for getting lessons from
the place. Also, it can be a unique feature of this hospital and they can contribute to
understanding of hospital and job creation by hiring facility management sector.

Inclusion of Health Promotions Program in the Orientation

We believe the Health Promotion Programs such as Smoking Prevention and
Weight-loss programs are interesting and are worth sharing during the orientation.
English Materials for Foreign Visitors
The foreign visitors would appreciate more if the brochures, PPTs and others
advertisement materials have English version as well. This way, the visitors can
understand the content better.