Emergency Audit of Forestry Corporations Reveals Suspicion of License Lending and Theft Involving 6,749 Forestry Technicians

Following SBS's consecutive reports on the illegal leasing of licenses by forestry corporations and poor management practices, the results of an emergency audit by the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) have been released.

The BAI released the results of its regular audit on the Korea Forest Service today (July 27), which main content highlights that 184 forestry technicians belonging to forestry corporations were identified as deceased individuals, inmates, or long-term overseas residents.

According to the BAI, an investigation targeting 16,970 forestry technicians who had a history of registration with forestry corporations (2,229 in total) from 2023 to May of this year showed that 6,749 technicians across 1,663 corporations are suspected of having their qualifications lent or stolen.

Specifically, there were 823 cases where regular employment was deemed unlikely due to reasons such as a lack of employment insurance enrollment or no earned income, and 1,534 duplicate income cases where earned income from companies other than the forestry corporation was confirmed.

Along with these, a total of 6,664 individuals—including 4,307 people who had employment insurance and earned income records but earned small monthly incomes of 800,000 won or less—were deemed unlikely to be working on a regular basis, raising suspicions of license lending or theft.

In addition, separate field investigations based on personal information analysis revealed that 184 people (with some overlap) were in a condition where normal regular labor was impossible, such as being deceased, imprisoned, or staying overseas.

Forty-seven technicians maintained their registration under corporations for more than three months even after their death was reported, and among them, 9 were even newly registered to corporations after their death report.

Furthermore, there were 25 inmates, 41 long-term overseas residents, and 71 individuals judged to require long-term care.

Accordingly, the BAI notified the Korea Forest Service to utilize the relevant data for investigating the registration and management status of forestry technicians, and to take appropriate measures such as revoking corporation registrations based on the results.

Previously, the Government Joint Anti-Corruption Investigation Corps under the Office for Government Policy Coordination also announced its interim findings that around 900 forestry corporations were suspected of illegal acts such as technical qualification lending and dual employment, or failing to meet registration requirements, following a joint inspection on the implementation status of forestry projects.
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.