Hwaseong City Moves to Attract National Museum of Natural History

Hwaseong City is joining forces with Gyeonggi Province to actively pursue attracting the National Museum of Natural History.

Hwaseong City announced on the 29th that it plans to establish a promotion task force and advisory committee together with Gyeonggi Province to bring the National Museum of Natural History to the Gongjung-ri Dinosaur Fossil Site area in Songsan-myeon, Hwaseong City, and to officially begin attraction activities.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism is currently exploring locations for the National Museum of Natural History under a plan to construct it with 650 billion won in national funding by 2027.

In connection with this, the city is working with Gyeonggi Province to promote the construction of the National Museum of Natural History, including a dinosaur ecology museum, a dinosaur ecology research institute, and a nature learning center on a 330,000-square-meter site in the Gongjung-ri area.

Separately, the Sejong City Government Building and Construction Authority is moving forward to attract the National Museum of Natural History to Sejong City, which is expected to result in keen competition.

Meanwhile, four world-renowned dinosaur fossil site experts—Dr. Michael Ryan from the United States (head of vertebrate paleontology at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History) and Professor Philip Currie from Canada (faculty member at the University of Alberta Department of Biology)—visited the Hwaseong City dinosaur egg fossil site (located at San 5-beonji, Gojeong-ri, Songsan-myeon) on the 28th.

Dr. Michael Ryan, who visited the fossil site, said, “Normally, even when a natural history museum is built, you can only see fossils after they are moved to the museum, but it is very interesting to be able to see them directly on-site,” according to officials.