Gyeonggi Province and Virginia Agree to Form Six-Member Council

With Gyeonggi Province and the U.S. state of Virginia agreeing to form a six-member council and hold regular meetings, substantive exchanges between the two regions are expected to expand.

Gyeonggi Province Governor Nam Kyung-pil and Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe signed an 'Agreement on the Establishment of a Policy Council' between the two regions at 11 a.m. on the 28th at the Gyeonggi Provincial Government headquarters situation room.

According to the agreement, the two regions will form a council of six members, with three from each side, and will promote cooperation through regular meetings in areas including trade, investment, technology, culture, human exchanges, and information and communications technology.

The province appointed Economic Director Choi Hyun-deok as co-chairman of the council, while Virginia appointed Maurice Jones, Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade, who previously served as U.S. Deputy Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, as its co-chairman.

Virginia is a hub for the data industry through which more than half of the world's internet traffic passes. The province expects to receive support for the Big Pie Project that Governor Nam is pursuing through this agreement.

Meanwhile, Governor McAuliffe, who took office in January, promised during his election campaign to mark the East Sea alongside the Sea of Japan in the Korean American community and became a topic of discussion when he became the first governor among the 50 U.S. states to sign the East Sea marking bill into law on March 30.