Op-Ed The Law is a Large Gear; PROJECT 100 is the On-Ground Gear

The passage of a law does not automatically change the world. If legislation sets the direction, policy creates the path, and on-ground practice actually enables people to walk that path. The "Demographic Strategy Basic Law" taking effect on September 10 is a complete revision of the "Low Birth Rate and Aged Society Basic Law." This is why I reconsider the significance of PROJECT 100 when looking at this new law.

The new law requires the Demographic Strategy Committee to cooperate with relevant central government agencies and local governments to establish a five-year demographic strategy master plan. The master plan includes forecasts of demographic structural changes and their socio-economic impacts, structural reform tasks, population inflow and demographic education, as well as funding methods and medium- to long-term investment directions. Annual implementation plans established by central and local governments are also connected to this larger framework. Population policy now becomes a system that penetrates national planning, budgets, and local administration—no longer merely adding a few campaigns.

The question is "what will be implemented?" This is precisely where PROJECT 100 gains significance. Breaking down population issues into 100 tasks is not about filling a number. The core is to decompose the problems that citizens actually experience in their daily lives into policy units, and then attach to each task a responsible party, timeline, funding, and performance indicators.

For young people, tuition, employment, dormitories, rent, housing, and marriage form a single life course. After marriage, pregnancy, childbirth, postnatal care, childcare, and education follow. In businesses, hiring, work hours, parental leave, and career interruption issues are interconnected. In regions, industry, universities, healthcare, transportation, culture, and housing are linked. If each is treated as a separate project, budgets increase but citizens' lives remain unchanged.

Therefore, PROJECT 100 requires three principles. First is verification. Before proposing policy, we must confirm its effects, side effects, costs, and legal grounds. Second is linkage. A single housing measure must be organically connected to youth policy, marriage policy, and birth encouragement policy. Third is implementation. Good ideas should not remain in declarations but must be developed into policy proposals that the central government, local governments, the National Assembly, and businesses can actually adopt.

This is also where the role of public interest organizations lies. They should not merely criticize the government or attempt to replace government projects. They must develop into a "private demographic policy platform" that investigates the field, discovers problems, refines them into policy through expert verification, informs citizens, and then re-evaluates implementation results.

Some of the PROJECT 100 initiatives can become national tasks to propose to the central government. Some can become legislative tasks for the National Assembly, and some can be pursued through ordinances and budgets of the ninth elected local governments. Some will become corporate family-friendly management practices, university demographic education, or civil society campaigns. This is precisely the 5UNITY approach.

There is no need to implement all 100 tasks at once. Based on national ripple effects and urgency, CORE tasks can be selected first, and tasks requiring field verification can start as pilot programs. What matters is not the number 100, but the question: "Does policy actually change people's lives?"

The large gear of the "Demographic Strategy Basic Law" will begin turning from September 10. PROJECT 100 must become the on-ground implementation shaft that meshes with that gear. Only when law, policy, and national movement turn in unison rather than separately can "birth encouragement" finally evolve into "a paradigm shift toward demographic recovery."

"The transformation of South Korea's demographic recovery movement is a third national salvation campaign.

We rebuild the Republic of Korea through demographic recovery,

and open the world's future through Hongik.

Hope Korea! Happy Korea! Hongik Korea!

HOPE KOREA! HAPPY KOREA! HONGIK KOREA!"

Let's Go Together!

Park Hee-jun, Chairman of the Korea Birth Encouragement Association / Ph.D. in Demography