POSCO to spend 1.1 tln won on safety budget for 3 years
South Korea's leading steelmaker POSCO said Thursday it will allocate 1.105 trillion won (US$1 billion) to its safety budget for the next three years.
The move comes after the deaths of four workers were reported in a nitrogen inhalation accident at the steelmaker's plant in Pohang, about 370 kilometers southeast of Seoul, in January.
In the past three years, POSCO spent 545.3 billion won on various safety-related updates.
The sum earmarked is equal to the money used in the previous three years plus an additional 559.7 billion won that the steelmaker wants to spend on further updating its safety regime from 2018 to 2020, a company spokesman said.
The company operates steel mills in Pohang and Gwangyang, on the southeastern and southern coasts, respectively. Their combined capacity reaches 38 million tons of steel products per year.
