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A lady browses sanitary pad merchandise at a big grocery store in Seoul. Korea Instances picture by Hong In-gi
“State-produced sanitary pads” have emerged as a subject of debate in Korean politics after President Lee Jae Myung repeatedly criticized the excessive value of menstrual merchandise and ordered officers to discover insurance policies to supply them freed from cost.
As the federal government evaluations the feasibility of such a plan, some observers have already begun referring to it as a “fundamental sanitary pad” coverage — a nod to Lee’s earlier push for “fundamental earnings” throughout his time as a neighborhood authorities head.
Girls’s teams, nonetheless, warning that affordability can not come on the expense of security.
In response to authorities officers on Sunday, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Household lately held an inner assembly to debate coverage responses to the excessive value of sanitary pads.
Alongside current choices reminiscent of in-kind distribution and voucher assist, the ministry can be contemplating a contract-manufacturing mannequin proposed by Lee.
Underneath this method, the federal government would fee the manufacturing of sanitary pads that meet a baseline high quality customary and distribute them freed from cost to designated teams.
Korean President Lee Jae Myung speaks throughout a Cupboard assembly at Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul, Jan. 20. Korea Instances picture by Wang Tae-suk
Lee calls without cost pads assembly baseline high quality requirements
The difficulty was first raised in final month, when Lee requested officers to research why sanitary pads in Korea are dearer than these offered abroad throughout a coverage briefing with the Honest Commerce Fee (FTC) and the gender ministry.
Knowledge helps the priority. A monitoring report by the Korean Girls’s Environmental Community in Might 2023 discovered that home sanitary pad costs had been about 39 p.c larger than these in overseas markets.
However Lee has argued that cash-based subsidies alone are ineffective in reining in market costs.
“Authorities handing out subsidies would solely assist corporations ripping off customers,” stated the president stated at a Cupboard assembly final month.
“We should always take into account whether or not the state can produce low-cost pads with fundamental high quality requirements and supply them freed from cost to sure recipients.”
Concern that value is prioritized over security
The Korean Girls’s Environmental Community, whereas welcoming the administration’s willingness to handle the problem, stated that security issues have additionally been a significant driver of rising costs.
“Sanitary pad pricing has been formed not solely by larger uncooked materials prices but additionally by advertising and marketing methods constructed round security anxieties,” the group stated. “Many customers, in search of to scale back potential well being dangers, have turned to natural or eco-friendly ‘premium’ merchandise perceived as safer, in the end paying extra.”
The activist group emphasised that the federal government ought to concentrate on producing sanitary pads which are each inexpensive and demonstrably secure, reasonably than merely low cost.
Requires market evaluation earlier than free distribution
Critics who emphasize market ideas warn that with out first addressing structural value distortions, introducing free sanitary pads might backfire.
Providing free pads earlier than analyzing elements reminiscent of distribution margins, import laws and certification and labeling techniques places coverage steps out of order, in accordance with Middle for Free Enterprise.
“As soon as the state units official requirements for value and high quality, customers danger changing into passive recipients constrained by these benchmarks.”
The Korean Girls’s Environmental Community additionally referred to as for thorough market investigation to search out trigger for larger costs, urging the FTC to conduct a complete probe into sanitary pad pricing and to reveal its findings publicly.
“Broader analysis into ladies’s precise utilization experiences, monetary burdens throughout buy and constraints on selection all should be checked out,” the group stated.
It additionally pressed for stronger security oversight, together with publicity and toxicity assessments for menstrual merchandise, and for constructing a system by which manufacturing, administration and distribution function beneath clear state duty.
This text from the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Instances, is translated by a generative AI system and edited by The Korea Instances.
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