President Lee visits Swedish eco-city to advocate green growth

By Byun Duk-kun
STOCKHOLM, July 11 (Yonhap) -- South Korean President Lee Myung-bak visited a
small eco-friendly Swedish city Saturday, a trip highlighting his vision of
national development based on low-carbon, green growth.
Lee flew here earlier in the day from Italy where he attended the expanded summit
of the G-8 and the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate.
Lee's trip to the Swedish city of Hammarby is linked to his plan to announce next
month that his government will make green growth its new national development
strategy.
"The city is a good model for an environmentally friendly city where all its
energy needs are generated and used within the city," Lee told reporters.
Hammarby was a run-down old industrial town with severe pollution problems up
until the 1990s when the Swedish government decided to turn it into an
environmentally friendly city for other urban areas in the country.
The city is now known worldwide as the Hammarby model for environmentally
friendly city development, according to Erik Freudenthal, an official from the
city's environment information center Glass House, who guided the South Korean
president on the trip.
Hammarby is still in the making and is expected to house some 20,000 residents
when it is completed by 2017, Freudenthal said.
The South Korean president is here on a three-day trip, during which he will meet
with King Carl Gustaf and hold talks with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik
Reinfeldt.
bdk@yna.co.kr
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