Hallyu actually makes some money for South Korea

[ashiva.livejournal.com]

Korea raised nearly $800 million from the export of television dramas, movies and K-pop content last year, the Bank of Korea said Monday, raking in the highest amount of revenue since overseas sales began in 1997.

The culture industry generated a total of 890 billion won ($793 million) from the Korean Wave or hallyu in 2011, the highest overseas profit since the central bank started collecting related data in 1980. The industry generated no revenue from selling cultural content abroad up until 1996.

“The industry posted a dramatic increase in sales after K-pop started to appeal to the mainstream in the U.S. and Europe last year,” a BOK official said.

Explosive growth in overseas profits began in 1997 when the industry raised $5 million from selling Korean dramas. The figure jumped to $268 million by 2005 and to $637 million in 2010.

Such rapid growth is attracting heavy government investment. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism plans to spend 33.5 billion won this year to promote Korean culture.

Separately, overseas construction orders raised $15.16 billion last year, up 26.8 percent from a year earlier. Contractors such as Ssangyong Engineering & Construction, Samsung C&T Corp., Hyundai Engineering & Construction won major contracts in Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam, expanding even as the local industry shrank 5 percent.

Overseas sales for logistics and insurance companies fell however, as trade shrank on slower growth in the advanced economies. The transport industry raised $ 37.1 billion from abroad last year, down 4.9 percent from 2010. Insurers raised $419 million in the same period, down 18.7 percent from 2010.

Source: Cynthia J. Kim @ The Korea Herald

I kinda suspect though that most of it came from Japan instead of Europe/USA. :-\

Comments

[asnindie.livejournal.com]

Obviously it's Japan and not USA or Europe lol. But good for them, they're smart at exporting their culture.

[cast-no-shadow0.livejournal.com]

I think this could include non-Asian countries if they're including exporting to the U.S. through online means like Dramafever and Netflix. I have subscriptions to both and Dramafever obviously has a lot of Korean dramas they have to pay for the right to show, and City Hunter, My Princess, Boys Over Flowers, and others have recently been available on Netflix streaming. This is true for Hulu too, I haven't looked recently, but they had kdramas on there too.

TL;DR: There are legal ways for people to watch subbed kdramas in the U.S. that allow the companies to be paid for the dramas they export.

[benihime99.livejournal.com]