South Korea’s Jeju province and ICON hold briefing session for establishing ‘Jeju Blockchain Regulatory Sandbox’

South Korean blockchain project ICON has announced that it sponsored a briefing session for establishing the Jeju Blockchain Regulatory Sandbox with private companies in attendance in Seoul.

The session aimed to create a bridge between governments and companies pushing the growth of the domestic blockchain industry. It followed an initial session that was held on February 20.

The well-attended meeting was observed by the Jeju Special Self-Governing Province of South Korea. Heeseop Roh, the Director of the Jeju Future Strategy Department, and Youngsoo Han, the Section Chief of the Jeju Future Strategy Department, introduced their plans for the "Regulatory Sandbox for Regional Innovation and Growth," which will be implemented in April.

More than 60 participants from 30 blockchain companies, including ICONLOOP (tech company of ICON), Deblock (Seoul Launchpad of ICX Station), ICON DApp (Decentralized application) partners including ‘Airbloc,’ ‘Cosmochain,’ ‘Webloc’, ‘SOMESING,’ ‘STAYGE,’ and ‘VELIC’, joined the briefing session.

Local governments, such as Jeju and Busan, are moving forward to be designated as blockchain special zones under the ‘Act on Special Economic Zones for specialized regional development’, which will be implemented in April.

Jeju aims to push for three special zones – blockchain, electric vehicles, and cosmetics – blockchain is the first priority. The province plans to apply for the special zone designation once the Districts Act is enacted. It is currently handling interest and inquiries through its dedicated website.

If Jeju applies for a blockchain special zone, the special zone will be selected after a final review by the Special Economic Zone Commission on Regulatory Freedom presided over by the Prime Minister in July.

Following the local government's application and approval from the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, companies can utilize three types of regulatory special circumstances – regulatory verification, temporary demonstration, temporary approval – as well as financial support, tax support and reduction of levies.

• Regulatory verification will remove legal grey areas and create a simple system to verify whether or not a project can be authorized
• Temporary demonstration will allow testing of an idea prior to specific regulation
• Temporary approval will allow for the creation of a market, under certain conditions, prior to the adoption of specific regulation.

ICON prepared a presentation in an effort to improve the understanding of the blockchain special zone and increase public-private cooperation.

“We hope this event will be a great first step toward the creation of regulatory special zones and will continue to bridge the gap between government and private companies to further push the adoption of blockchain technology,” ICON said.