South Korea Seeks to Foster Wellness Tourism

South Korea will expand support for wellness tourism to attract health-conscious tourists across the world by combining it with unique local content such as beauty, oriental medicine, food and public saunas, the government said Wednesday.

    The Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism hosted the "International Forum on Wellness Tourism 2016" in Seoul to discuss the latest market trends and strategies with government and industry officials in the tourism, hotel and health sectors.

    While medical tourism targets patients in need of treatments, wellness tourism is a more proactive and broad concept that seeks to improve or maintain health and quality of life by picking destinations for spas, beauty, fitness, meditation and other healthy activities, South Korea's News Agency (Yonhap) reported.

    The ministry said it will expand support to develop Korean-style wellness content by combining beauty, meditation, temple stays, oriental medicine and public bathhouses.

    The global wellness tourism market is estimated at 446 trillion won (US$438.6 billion) in 2013, accounting for 14% of the total tourism industry and more than double that of medical tourism, according to SRI International.