The Ministry of SMEs and Startups said on the 5th it will form a total of 62 small and medium-sized enterprise export consortia in 2026 to fully support entry into overseas markets.
The export consortium program is a policy that supports small and medium-sized enterprises that wish to export by product or by market to form consortia and jointly develop local markets through exhibitions, consultation meetings, and other activities.
In 2026, considering growing uncertainty in the global trade environment such as stronger protectionism, the related budget was increased by 3.9 billion won from the previous year to 19.8 billion won so that small and medium-sized enterprises can actively diversify export destinations and items.
Given the urgent situation for exporting companies, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups (MSS) announced the 2026 export consortium recruitment in Oct. last year to push the project forward quickly, and selected 62 consortia by focusing on the strategy and competitiveness of local market development activities among the 199 consortia received. During selection, balance by product (consumer goods, industrial goods) and by market (core, emerging markets) was considered along with application demand.
By product category, consumer goods such as beauty and fashion account for 46.8%, and industrial goods such as steel, machinery and metal, and electricity account for 38.7%. In particular, to diversify export markets, a total of 11 consortia (17.7%) targeting the Global South, including a Dubai medical device consortium aimed at India and the United Arab Emirates, were selected.
Once each consortium's composition is finalized, a three-step overseas market development process will proceed, moving from advance preparation in Korea such as local market research, to local dispatch to participate in exhibitions, and to follow-up such as buyer invitation consultation meetings.
Lee Soon-bae, director general for Global Growth Policy at the Ministry of SMEs and Startups (MSS), said, "The export consortium is a representative policy in which small and medium-sized enterprises jointly establish plans for overseas market development activities and the government backs them," adding, "We will systematically support efforts to further expand outcomes in core markets and to pioneer emerging markets with country-specific target strategies."