Hometown Love Return Gifts in One Place... 1st Hometown Love Festa to Be Held

[Anchor]

Interest is growing in the Hometown Love Donation system, where donating to a region other than your place of residence offers tax deductions and a return gift worth 30 percent of the donation. This weekend, a meaningful event will be held where people can experience hometown love donation return gifts from across the country while also making donations to regions facing the threat of depopulation.

Reporter Song In-ho has the details.

[Reporter]

This is a local food direct store in Goheung, Jeollanam-do.

The county directly sells about 300 types of local agricultural, livestock, and marine specialties. Without intermediary distribution steps, prices are affordable, and it leads to increased farm incomes.

Among these specialty products, about 100 items are provided as Hometown Love Donation return gifts.

[Kang Chun-ja / Head of Administration Division, Goheung County, Jeollanam-do: When we give our Goheung rice as a return gift like this, this is sample rice. We give this 500g of sample rice as an extra, as a bonus.]

Various breads shaped like fruits such as apples, watermelons, and peaches are on display.

Following in the footsteps of her father, a master baker, a daughter in her 30s spent years researching and developing these fruit breads, which use actual local agricultural products as ingredients.

When you make a hometown love donation to Sokcho, you can choose not only bread but also experience vouchers for making snacks as a return gift, making it popular among donors with children.

[Cho Sung-jo / CEO, Sokcho's Castle of Sweets: Most of the products here are items that go out a lot as return gifts or for gift purposes. The packaging design itself is so pretty.]

The 1st Hometown Love Festa, where you can see hometown love donation return gifts from all over the country in one place, will be held this weekend.

Co-hosted by SBS and the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, this event features about 60 outstanding local governments nationwide exhibiting return gifts that highlight regional characteristics, while also providing information on local tourist attractions, festivals, and travel.

In particular, various prize events have been prepared for visitors who collect stamps by visiting the booths of 13 participating local governments, as well as for on-site donors.

Real-time social media broadcasts introducing local specialty products will also be held for prospective donors who cannot visit the venue in person.

Visitors can also receive on-site tax consultations, such as finding out how much tax benefits they can receive by donating to their hometown.

As a side event, the first South Korea-Japan international seminar for the development of the Hometown Love Donation system will be held domestically for the first time.

The event, which will be held for two days starting from the 19th at the aT Center in Yangjae-dong, Seoul, is open to everyone for free.

(Video by Lim Dong-guk | Video Editing by Kim Ho-jin)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.