South Korean government plans to focus on adopting blockchain technology, Ko Wen-je: Our country's digital infrastructure is very poor!

According to the "Korean Version of the New Deal Comprehensive Plan" released by the South Korean government, the government will adopt blockchain technology in two core focuses, the Digital New Deal and the Green New Deal, to improve digital infrastructure. In contrast, the Taiwanese government does not seem to prioritize digital infrastructure as much. Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je recently made a surprising statement in an interview, saying, "Our country's digital infrastructure is very poor!"

South Korean Government to Focus on Blockchain Technology

The South Korean government recently released the "Korean Version of the New Deal," planning to invest 160 trillion Korean won (approximately 3.9 trillion Taiwanese dollars) by 2025 to create 1.9 million job positions. According to the content of the "Korean Version of the New Deal," the plan focuses on three core areas: digital new policy, green new policy, and strengthening employment social safety nets. Local news outlet Chosun reported that blockchain technology will play a crucial role in both the digital new policy and the green new policy.

It is reported that the South Korean government plans to apply blockchain technology to provide financial support for low-income and vulnerable groups to optimize social welfare administrative tasks, as well as transactions in new energy and renewable energy, promoting transparency in transactions between power companies and new and renewable energy generation companies. The anti-counterfeiting and tamper-proof characteristics of blockchain technology can also be used to improve the current real estate market. Additionally, the South Korean government plans to use this technology to provide "digital identification" for online identity verification systems and activate decentralized identity verification (DID) services that can directly manage personal information.

Furthermore, the government will support the development of Blockchain as a Service (BaaS), a service that allows small and medium-sized enterprises and startups to easily implement their business concepts using blockchain infrastructure.

Taiwan's Insufficient Digital Infrastructure

Compared to South Korea's emphasis on digital infrastructure and blockchain technology, the Taiwanese government seems to have room for improvement in this area. Taking the recent stimulus triple stimulus vouchers as an example, the Executive Yuan's triple stimulus vouchers were first distributed on July 15, and many people have rushed to collect them. According to statistics from Chunghwa Post today, by noon, 543,235 paper vouchers had been sold, which is 112,644 more than the 435,91 sold by noon yesterday.

Although the purpose of the triple stimulus vouchers is to promote consumer spending through the distribution of vouchers to stimulate the Taiwanese economy, the effectiveness of Taiwan's digital infrastructure can still be questioned. Looking back to the consumption vouchers distributed to the entire population in response to the consumption contraction effect brought about by the global financial crisis of 2008, it can be seen that after so many years, Taiwan's performance in digital infrastructure is still not ideal. Despite the government introducing digital versions of stimulus vouchers, the adoption rate remains quite low, as Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je mentioned in a recent interview:

"(The public) still go for paper vouchers, and we spent 900 million printing those D/P. Now we need to print an additional 150 million. 70% of our people go for paper vouchers, what does this show? Our country's digital infrastructure is poor."

Taking the triple stimulus vouchers as an example, the production of paper vouchers itself incurs significant costs, and shortly after the vouchers were distributed, there were reports of fake vouchers circulating in the market. Such issues could be effectively avoided by using a blockchain system in conjunction with other digital infrastructure. However, it seems that the Taiwanese government does not prioritize this technology to leverage its potential in improving current systems as much as the South Korean government does.