The number of foreign nationals in Korea hit an all-time high this year, making up 3 percent of the country’s total population.

According to statistics from the Justice Ministry on Friday, 1.41 million foreign nationals were present in the nation as of September this year, with Chinese taking the lion’s share.

“The increase has to do with the economic recovery since last year to first half of this year,” said Gwak Jae-seok, director of the Migration and Diaspora Research Institute.

About 600,000 of them were on migrant worker visas, the largest portion. Of them, some 540,000, or about 90 percent, had legal status.

The MIDRI said the number of foreign workers started to increase rapidly in the past couple of years because of the government’s policies to allow Korean companies having difficulty finding Korean employees to hire foreign migrant workers in 2004 and to allow ethnic Koreans living in China and Central Asian countries to acquire working visas in 2007.

Next to foreign workers, foreigners marrying Koreans, mostly brides, accounted for about 10 percent of the total foreign residents. Chinese and ethnic Koreans living in China also topped the list with 45.4 percent, followed by Vietnamese with 25.35 percent, Japanese with 7.64 percent, Filipinos with 5.58 percent and Cambodians with 3.13 percent. Immigrant grooms also took 13.53 percent of the foreigners marrying Koreans.

Foreign students made up the third-biggest group among foreigners. Chinese students also was the biggest group with 72.9 percent, followed by Mongolian, Vietnamese, Japanese and American students.

As their numbers rise, some foreigners experience discrimination in Korea.

“My foreign friends and I went to a restaurant, and we ordered dishes, but the owner asked us to pay the bill first while other Koreans pay after they eat,” said 25-year-old Chen Songzhe, a Chinese student studying at Kyung Hee University.

The Multicultural Society Research Institute stressed the need for a better understanding of diversity and cultural differences.

“We need to make an effort to understand them better because every human being should be treated equally,” said the director of the institute.

As more foreigners are expected to come to Korea as the country continues to have a low birth rate, Korea should get the best out of immigrants and utilize their abilities, Gwak said. 


By Lee Woo-young
(wylee@heraldcorp.com)