Ryu Hyeon-cheol, head of the Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL) Industrial Safety and Health Headquarters, said on the 4th that "we must ensure that investing in safety can become the competitiveness of corporations," adding, "when workers are put at risk, corporations should rightly be put in jeopardy as well."
Deputy Minister Ryu said at an inauguration ceremony held at the Government Complex Sejong on the afternoon of the 4th that "rather than a virtuous cycle in which corporations' active investment in workers' safety and industrial accident prevention leads to revenue generation, it is acting as a concern about a decline in price competitiveness," adding, "no matter how much workers die or are put in danger, it does not lead to risk for corporations."
Ryu noted that "this 'risk gap' between workers and corporations will not narrow without social intervention," and pointed out that "the law and systems have so far failed to adequately respond to the structural causes of industrial accidents." He added, "rather than short-term fluctuations, we must lay the groundwork for a long-term downward trend in serious accidents that will be irreversible no matter which government comes in the future."
Deputy Minister Ryu said, "we must closely assess in which industries, sectors, and employment relationships safety and health risks appear, and the standards for risk estimation must go beyond lagging indicators such as statistics on approved industrial accident medical care and accident fatality disasters to be derived through a variety of leading indicators," adding, "through this, we should set priorities for regulation, oversight, and support, and be able to forecast the plausible scope of policy."
Meanwhile, Deputy Minister Ryu is the first head to take office after the position of head of the ministry's Industrial Safety and Health Headquarters was elevated to Vice Minister level. A specialist in occupational and environmental medicine, he served as a director of the Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Medicine and as chair of the Work Environment and Health Center.