Yeongcheon, a quiet city 350 kilometers southeast of Seoul in North Gyeongsang Province, is reinventing itself as the mecca for Korean wine.
With population of some 100,300, Yeongcheon was originally most known as a major producer of grapes.
The city forayed in to the wine business in 2007, and after 10 years, Yeongcheon now counts 68 wineries and 35 percent of Korea’s domestic wine. About 270,000 bottles of wine come from the region annually.
(Yeoncheon Agricultural Technology & Extension Center)
Since 2010, Yeongcheon has been coming up with wine-related tour packages. Yeongcheon Wine Tour ran between July and November with family-friendly programs such as wine-infused soap-making and grape tasting.
Local authorities plan to double the number of wineries in the region in the near future and build a wine-themed village to further expand the tourism business.
By Lim Jeong-yeo (kaylalim@heraldcorp.com)
