2017 KAPEX Academy Graduation Ceremony Held

The Korea Rural Economic Institute (KREI) on Sep. 14 had the 2017 KAPEX Academy Graduation Ceremony. The KAPEX (Korean Agricultural Policy Experiences for Food Security) program develops international cooperation projects, and supports strengthening developing countries’ public officials’ capacity to establish agricultural and rural policies and implement them for the nations’ food security and poverty eradication. The KAPEX Academy is a program for nurturing global talent that KREI has operated for four years. This year, nine public officers in the fields of agriculture and rural regions from Nepal, Uzbekistan, and Colombia participated in the program for three months (June 12—Sep. 14).

The 2017 KAPEX Academy consisted of 30 classes including experts’ lectures and field trips regarding Korea’s agricultural and rural policy situation and implementation cases. Also, trainees conducted policy research on various areas with KREI’s related experts. The research results are expected to be actively utilized in establishing policies of the trainees’ countries.

The trainees said that they learned many things about Korean agriculture and agricultural policy, and lessons that they can use in their nations’ agricultural policies. Particularly, the participants showed much interest in Korea’s development process with the successful economic growth over the past 60 years and agricultural and livestock development, the agricultural fields with intensive technologies such as ICT, and successful Korean policies on agricultural cooperatives.