The casino sector has been excluded from government support during the pandemic and the situation could impact on employment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
South Korea.- The casino and gaming sector on the island of Jeju is feeling the impact of the Covid-19 crisis and analysts have warned about the possibility of widespread layoffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to local press, while many other businesses have received special employment support assistance from the government, the casino sector has been excluded. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
That situation is leading the casinos to a deeper economic crisis in a context in which the flow of tourists has stopped due to measures to contain the spread of the virus. As the casinos in Jeju are foreigner-only venues, the situation is critical.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to the Jeju Island Tourism Association, foreign tourists arrivals to Jeju were down by 98.5 per cent in the second quarter of 2020, with only 6,246 foreign tourists coming to the province over the entire three-month period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today only four of the island’s eight casinos are open in some form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of the eight companies reportedly ended its financial support to furloughed workers in July, and at least three others are expected to follow suit by the end of October.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A Ministry of Employment and Labor official said the casinos crisis is not a priority for the government: \u201cWe understand the difficult reality faced by the casino industry, but we judged that the situation for the travel industry and for duty-free shops is even more dire, and for that reason the casino industry has not been our priority for support measures.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The casino sector has been excluded from government support during the pandemic and the situation could impact on employment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9370,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The casino sector on Jeju Island, South Korea, is facing a severe economic crisis due to a 98.5% drop in foreign tourist arrivals, exacerbated by its exclusion from government pandemic support. This situation has led to widespread operational closures, the cessation of financial aid for furloughed workers, and warnings of significant layoffs, as the government prioritizes other tourism verticals.","focusai_entities":"Jeju Island Tourism Association, Ministry of Employment and Labor","focusai_location":"South Korea, Jeju Island","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (0.8), compliance_legal (0.7), operator_casino (1.0), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.8), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Jeju Casino Recovery Plan?","query":"What specific policy interventions or regulatory adjustments are being considered by the South Korean government to prevent a complete collapse of the Jeju foreigner-only casino sector, given its unique economic contribution and employment impact?"},{"label":"Regional Market Viability?","query":"How does the government's decision to deprioritize casino sector support in Jeju compare with aid packages for gaming verticals in other APAC jurisdictions, and what are the long-term implications for regional market viability and foreign investment?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[160,28,16333],"tags":[12436,152],"class_list":["post-9368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-casino-news","category-south-east-asia-news","tag-casinos","tag-south-korea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9368"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9377,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9368\/revisions\/9377"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}