Minister Oh Youngju said, "The recent political situation and the inauguration of the Trump administration, along with the unstable domestic and foreign environments, will pose a greater challenge to the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and small business owners who are the policy targets of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups (MSS). The MSS will act as a strong pillar that small and medium-sized enterprises and small business owners can rely on and trust."
On the 31st, Minister Oh shared the achievements and significance of the MSS over the past year with employees through the internal network.
First, Minister Oh noted, "The past year was a precious time when the MSS became one team and worked hard to create meaningful achievements for the continuous growth and leap of small and medium-sized enterprises, small business owners, and venture startups." He added, "Through a problem-solving approach, all employees worked to build a field-centered communication and policy implementation system, visiting over 200 sites."
He continued, "Despite the field-centered policies over the past year, considering the scale of the policy targets reaching 8 million and the diversity of the environments faced by these targets, there are still many places we have not properly grasped. We will continue to address the issues at the sites with prompt policy alternatives."
He also mentioned the MSS's strategy for small and medium-sized enterprises. Minister Oh stated, "Given the ongoing transformative changes in our economy, such as population decline, aging, digitalization, and carbon neutrality, it is significant that we have established a medium- to long-term master plan to support the proactive responses of small and medium-sized enterprises and small business owners. The year 2024 will be a year when the MSS solidifies its core policy capabilities as a 'policy ministry.'"
He also remarked, "It is time to ensure that measures do not remain just as measures but become substantial driving forces that change the field."
Minister Oh noted that a system was established to effectively support the globalization of small and medium-sized enterprises, venture startups, and small business owners through private-public collaboration. He stated, "We built a 'One Team Council' collaborating with 25 overseas diplomatic missions in 17 countries, financial institutions, law firms, among others, and organized various policy systems to provide optimized support for the overseas export and entry of small and medium-sized enterprises."
Regarding the potential decline in public trust in the MSS due to issues like the Tmon and Wemep incidents and mismanagement of the Onnuri gift certificates, he said, "We have made efforts to accurately grasp the situation at the sites while quickly formulating alternatives and simultaneously seeking fundamental solutions to these issues." He added, "While it is regrettable that we hoped the effort to identify and improve the shortcomings of the system occurred before such problems arose, we learned lessons for our work and policy direction from solving these issues."
Finally, Minister Oh emphasized, "Regarding the recent political situation, as a member of the Cabinet, I am spending the end of the year with a heavy sense of responsibility and remorse toward the public. We will work diligently, without wavering, to ensure that we fulfill the tasks we must do together until the end."