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Foreign investment into Korea has been declining for three years running, with funds from the European Union and Japan in particular falling greatly.
The decline is because Korea is less competitive as a global production base than China and India and also less attractive as a global research and development center than Japan and Singapore.
The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy said Sunday that foreign investment last year fell 6.5 percent to US$10.51 billion from $11.24 billion in 2006. In 2005 the figure was $11.56 billion and in 2004 it was $12.79 billion.
By industry, the manufacturing industry saw a 36.7 percent decrease to $2.69 billion from the previous year, while the service industry saw a 14.9 percent increase to $7.6 billion.
Investment from U.S. companies rose 37.2 percent to $2.34 billion, while EU companies, the biggest foreign investors, reduced their investment by 13 percent to $4.32 billion. Investment from Japanese companies fell 53 percent to $990 million.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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