Issue Korean strength: Manufacturing automation

Summary

KDI highlights Korea's manufacturing automation as a key asset for coping with population decline. Korea has 1,012 industrial robots per 10,000 manufacturing workers, the highest density in the world, well ahead of Singapore at 770 and China at 470. Robot density first passed 1,000 in 2021 and has stayed more than six times the global average of 162. The report reads this as evidence that Korea already has technical infrastructure for responding to a shrinking workforce. The open question is how widely these productivity gains will extend beyond manufacturing into services and the care economy, which will shape Korea's realistic path through demographic change.