Biographies

Jung Sook Park focuses on Human-Centered Sustainable Smart Cities as the Secretary general of WeGO.

“As the world faces intensifying challenges as environmental tensions grow, populations age and urbanize, and wealth and consumption increase, it has become more important to address these challenges using a holistic and smart approach. In every sector of today’s society, ranging from the economy, education, infrastructure, governance, welfare, environment, tourism, and media, to arts, policy implementation is not possible without the smart city technology or mechanism.
Nowadays, smart city development is increasingly turning its attention to establishing the software or contents of smart cities. If culture is defined as ‘what we repeatedly do,’ the smart city is no longer a simple application of technology to solve urban issues. Smart city framework has become a culture in itself for the lives of citizens.”

Prior to her appointment as Secretary-General of WeGO in 2021, Jung Sook Park has dedicated her career in the field of international cooperation. She served as the Korean Representative of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations (GAVI) for ten years from 2009 to 2018, and she worked as a high-profile broadcaster as the host of morning news shows for major TV networks in Korea for over ten years from 1994 to 2004, as well as starring in “Jewel in the Palace,” one of the highest-rated TV dramas in the world. Since then, she has focused her career on education and research as a professor at Kyung Hee University and an adjunct professor of cultural diplomacy at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea.

She served as the honorary ambassador for Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), and the City of Seoul with a mission of increasing public awareness on Korea’s leading and responsible role in the international community. As a philanthropist, she is the Founder and Executive Director of the Multicultural Network & Hope Kids Korea, an NGO that provides education and mentoring for underprivileged children in Korea. Ms. Park is a graduate of Seoul Women’s University (BA), Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (MIA)in U.S., and Yonsei University’s School of Public Administration (MPA) in Korea. She was a visiting scholar and studied in a doctoral program at Keio University in Japan.

Currently, she has been appointed as a member of the Committee for International Development Cooperation and Exim bank of Korea, which decides Korea’s ODA policy, and is also a member of the board of the Korean Olympic Committee, responsible for sports exchanges, and engages in a member of the audience committee of CBS Broadcasting Corporation.