[Anchor]

There was a time when this country was sustained by producing steel and exporting it.

For over half a century, South Korea was a manufacturing powerhouse.

Now, shuttered steel factories symbolize the current state of our manufacturing industry.

Looking at this year's exports, aside from semiconductors, traditional manufacturing sectors such as automobiles, petroleum products, and steel are all struggling.

Fewer people are willing to work in manufacturing, and the industry itself is declining.

Recently, there has been a push to regain competitiveness by integrating AI into manufacturing, but what is the reality on the ground?

Reporter Ha Nuri has the story.

[Report]

This empty alley once stood as a symbol of manufacturing, the Incheon Namdong National Industrial Complex.

[Namdong Industrial Complex Employee/Voice Altered: "There is no work. Because there’s no work, we’re letting go of regular employees."]

Amid rows of "temporarily closed" factories, we found one where the sound of machines could still be heard.

[Choi Young-rok/Equipment Company CEO: "The person at the end is 67 years old. If someone is in their 50s, we're grateful. (Is it because of low wages?) Even my son doesn’t want to come."]

As both jobs and workers disappear, 34% of companies in the Namdong Industrial Complex have shut down.

This is a nationwide phenomenon.

The number of people working in South Korea's manufacturing sector has declined for 20 consecutive months.

[Cheon Gyeong-gi/Ministry of Employment and Labor Future Employment Analysis Division Chief/June 9 Briefing: "The difficulties in manufacturing are expected to continue due to ongoing uncertainties, making short-term recovery difficult."]

A possible solution is gaining attention: AI.

[President Lee Jae Myung/AI Global Cooperation Business Meeting/June 20: "It seems that most traditional manufacturing industries in South Korea need AI innovation."]

Like these factories where robots work with the lights off, the idea is to integrate AI into manufacturing to cut costs and boost productivity.

But for small business owners, such investment is a burden.

[Choi Young-rok/Equipment Company CEO: "That's not feasible for us. Large companies can automate logistics and invest in productivity, but we can’t."]

For the workers in manufacturing, it is a matter of survival.

There are projections that AI integration could eliminate up to 930,000 manufacturing jobs.

[Kim Soo-hyun/Research Fellow, Korea Employment Information Service: "We need to prepare ways to integrate older individuals into the social safety net through education and training."]

To revive manufacturing with AI, we must first rebuild an environment where people can work, through equipment investment and retraining the existing workforce.

This is KBS News, Ha Nuri.

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