S Korean military makes drastic cost cuts

S Korean military makes drastic cost cuts

By Song Jung-a in Seoul

Published: March 24 2008 19:57 | Last updated: March 25 2008 02:20

South Korea’s soldiers will be asked to make do with one bath a week, while its air force pilots will have to do more training on computers instead of real fighters as record oil prices force the country to take drastic steps to slash its fuel usage.

The measures are among several that arose from an emergency meeting last week where senior officials in the army, navy and air force discussed ways of reducing their fuel bill, a military official said.

“We had to seek emergency steps to save fuel costs because oil prices have gone up too much,” the defence ministry said. It estimated that the military could save about Won77bn ($76m), or 11 per cent of its annual fuel bill, with the moves.

The air force plans to cut annual flight hours for training from 150 to 135 and ask pilots to use computer simulators more instead of flying real fighters, while the navy is to ask for the speed of its ships to be slowed down when they return from completing their duties.

There are also plans to take out of use old, fuel-inefficient ships.

Soldiers face tougher measures. The army plans to reduce the number of soldiers joining field drills and to minimise the use of oil-consuming heavy equipment for such training. It has also asked soldiers to take a bath only once a week.

The extreme measures underline the lengths to which the Korean government is willing to go as higher oil prices take a toll on Asia’s third biggest economy. South Korea is the world’s fifth largest oil importer, importing all of its oil demand.

President Lee Myung-bak, who was elected on pledges to revive economic growth, recently called for energy-saving measures, stressing that rising raw material prices were the biggest concern of the new government.

Still, scaling back military training for energy saving had not been expected, given that South Korea is formally still at war with its nuclear-armed, communist neighbour North Korea. Seoul has about 670,000 troops in its military, along with 28,000 US troops stationed in the country.

The impoverished North, however, has been hit even harder by the rise in fuel prices. Its 1.2m-strong military has grounded its ageing air force and kept tanks in bunkers for years.

Oil prices have risen sharply over the past 18 months on the back of a weakening US dollar and strong demand from emerging economies.

Prices breached $100 a barrel in January and surged to a record $111.80 a barrel last Monday.