Place Marketing as a New Strategy of Rural Development and Local Finance

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This research aims to clarify the effects of place marketing strategy as a new regional development scheme in rural Korea, which has experienced extremely fast changes since the Economic Crisis in 1997, looking specifically at Hampyong County in South-Cholla Province.The purpose of place marketing is the creation of a new image and marketing this image as a local resource, with the aim of helping to increase the regional economy. Developing the image of the region as a commercial good, based upon the current social demands, and selling this image, rather than local produce, achieves this.The success of the Hampyong county Butterfly Festival was mainly attributed to the local government's creation and marketing of an entirely new placeness within a short time, based on the current social trend of eco-tourism. The Hampyong County Butterfly Festival is an important example of place marketing simply for the fact that prior to its inception the area had no relationship to butterflies. This case study of the Hampyong County Butterfly Festival supports the speculation that placeness is a perceived characteristic of a certain place and is capable of being intentionally modified and/or created to fill the social requirements at that time.Along with the South Korean case, in Toyooka town, Japan, the Oriental White Stork has been successfully reintroduced to the wild. To facilitate this, the local farmers have slowly been restoring their agricultural practices to more environmentally friendly methods and the local government has worked towards restoring the natural habitat. This research also addressed the relationship between the Oriental White Stork and humans from the viewpoint of environmental history, and clarified the twisted attitudes toward environment and agriculture in the Toyooka region. Finally, the two cases were compared from the viewpoint of regional development strategy as well as local finance.