author : Jung, Jin Hwa (New Growth Industries Division)

1. Introduction
This paper analyzes the current labor issues in the electronics industry, identifying the underlying factors, and proposing the human resources development strategies, emphasizing the sectoral industry-academia partnership. In particular, it proposes the strengthened role of the Sectoral Human Resources Development Council (SHRDC), as a means to resolve chronic mismatches between labor demand and supply, and thus strengthen the industrial competitiveness.
The electronics industry takes an important role in the Korean economy, accounting for some 20% of the total added value and 13% of the total employment in the manufacturing sector as of the end of 2002. In particular, the electronics industry tends to be knowledge-intensive, yielding high value-added per worker and rendering a relatively large portion of high-skilled, high-paying jobs. Due to its knowledgeintensiveness, it is essential for the enhancement of industrial competitiveness to procure high-quality technological manpower, enabling the expediting of knowledge creation and technological innovation......