[Edaily Kang Gyeong-rok Travel Reporter] The government is set to promote the development of regional tourism clusters centered on five regional airports—Gimhae, Daegu, Cheongju, Muan, and Yangyang—by linking them with tourism products, transportation, and lodging facilities in neighboring areas. This marks a shift in focus from the previous approach, which concentrated on the development of tourism facilities by individual local governments, toward supporting the integration of tourists’ travel routes. The government plans to allocate 93.5 billion won in national and local funds next year and, when combined with related projects from relevant ministries, provide financial support totaling approximately 410 billion won.
Choi Hwi-young, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism, stated at a press briefing on the tourism sector on the 28th that revitalizing regional tourism must be a priority to prepare for an era of 30 to 40 million foreign tourists. The government believes it will be difficult to meet future growth in tourism demand if more than 80 percent of foreign tourists continue to visit the Seoul metropolitan area.
The government is revising its approach to fostering regional tourism due to limitations revealed during the implementation of existing projects. Until now, the government has promoted various regional tourism initiatives, such as “Tourism Hub Cities” and “Metropolitan Tourism Development.” However, there have been issues with neighboring local governments pursuing similar projects and insufficient connectivity between tourist destinations and transportation networks.
Regarding the differences from existing regional tourism projects, Minister Choi explained the limitations of an approach centered on individual local governments. “As each local government developed its own tourism content, similar projects were repeated, and there was a lack of coordination between regions,” Minister Choi said. “This time, we will design projects from the perspective of the actual tourists, rather than the local governments providing tourism facilities.” The intention is to start by mapping out the entire itinerary—from which city foreign visitors arriving at regional airports will pass through, where they will stay, and how they will travel to their next destination.

However, it remains to be seen to what extent expanding international flights at regional airports will actually lead to an increase in foreign tourists. This is because even if the number of flights increases, the demand for outbound travel by local residents could exceed the number of foreign visitors entering the country.
When this issue was raised during the roundtable discussion that day, Minister Choi expressed the view that foreign tourists could be attracted by leveraging the relatively lower accommodation rates and tourism packages available in regional areas compared to Seoul. Minister Choi noted, “While accommodation rates in Seoul are high due to the concentration of tourists, there is room to develop relatively affordable packages in regional areas,” and proposed the development of competitive packages targeting young travelers from China and Southeast Asia as a solution.
However, given that factors such as flight routes from the country of origin to the destination airport, flight frequency, and airfares all interact in complex ways, some point out that a differentiated strategy tailored to the specific conditions and catchment markets of each airport—including Gimhae, Daegu, Cheongju, Muan, and Yangyang—is necessary.
There is a way to increase foreign visitors to regional areas without relying on regional airports. This involves connecting foreign visitors who enter through existing international airports, such as Incheon International Airport, so they can travel to various regions using trains and buses.
Minister Choi also acknowledged the need to utilize existing transportation networks, such as the KTX, intercity buses, and rental cars. He explained that the government plans to coordinate the transportation systems, which are currently managed separately by local governments, to ensure tourists can travel conveniently. However, specific plans for transportation linkages within each tourism zone and concrete implementation schedules were not presented in this announcement.

Establishing an operating entity to ensure the sustainability of projects involving multiple local governments is also a challenge. Although Minister Choi emphasized that these are joint tourism zone projects rather than initiatives led by a single local government, a specific operational framework to oversee coordination among local governments and budget sharing must be developed in the future.
Meanwhile, to expand accommodation infrastructure, the government has separately allocated 152.3 billion won in the next fiscal year’s budget proposal to support loans for the construction of large-scale regional hotels. This is a private investment support program separate from the budget for establishing metropolitan tourism zones (93.5 billion won); for it to lead to actual hotel construction, demand for regional stays must first be verified.
The government plans to coordinate tourism policies across relevant ministries through the National Tourism Strategy Council, which will be elevated to a presidential-level body starting on the 29th. However, the specific operating entities for the five tourism zones, targets for expanding international flights, rail and bus connectivity projects, and plans for funding allocation among ministries have not yet been disclosed. The government’s proposed tourism budget for next year will be finalized following deliberation by the National Assembly.