hankyoreh

Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins swim in the waters off the coast of Seogwuipo, Jeju, (Ryu Woo-jong/The Hankyoreh)

Jeju Island is moving forward with a plan that would grant legal rights to the Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin, a protected species of dolphin that lives off the coast of the island in dwindling numbers.

At a briefing held at the Jeju Provincial Office on Monday, the island’s government stated that it would introduce Korea’s first-ever “eco legal personhood” system to protect Jeju’s environmental and ecological values and “set a new standard” for domestic ecological and environmental policies.

The environmental personhood system grants legal status to natural entities such as animals, rivers and lakes that have ecological value, much like how corporations are recognized as legal persons. This would be the first time any such system is adopted in Korea.

Internationally, environmental entities, such as rivers and animals, have been granted legal personhood status through constitutions, laws, precedents, and common law since the 2010s to protect nature from pollution and damage caused by humans.

Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin swim in the waters off the coast of Seogwuipo, Jeju, (Ryu Woo-jong/The Hankyoreh)

In order to introduce the environmental personhood system, Jeju has been operating a working group chaired by Choe Jae-chun, a distinguished professor at Ewha Womans University, composed of academics, lawyers, and experts, since March.

The working group has come up with two proposals. One would insert a provision for granting “legal personality” in the Special Act for the Establishment of Jeju Special Self-Governing Province and the Development of Free International City, and would directly grant legal personhood rights to the Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins living off the coast of Jeju.

The other would involve the creation of a special provision for the conferment of environmental personhood, which would allow the governor to designate specific species or key ecosystems with the consent of the provincial assembly and establish them as ecological legal entities.

The province plans to propose a bill to the National Assembly after the 2024 general election so that one of the two proposals can be reflected in the special act for Jeju, and to designate the Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin as Korea’s first “eco legal person” by 2025 at the latest.

“The introduction of the eco legal personhood system is an innovation to solve the common human challenge of overcoming the climate crisis and become a civilization where humans and nature coexist,” said Jeju Gov. Oh Young-hun.

By Heo Ho-Joon, Jeju correspondent

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]