Abstract
According to the report of the Korea Agro-Fisheries and Food Trade Corporation (2019), the size of the HMR food market in 2019 exceeded 4 trillion won. On the other hand, the consumption of agricultural products continued to decrease. As reported by Woo (2020) who analyzed consumer panel survey data, when the 2010 agricultural product purchase index was 100, the crop purchase index in 2019 was 72 and the vegetable and special crop purchase index was 69. Therefore, the Rural Development Administration promoted the research projects to develop the technologies for producing stably raw materials of HMR and for optimizing local foods as HMR ingredients. Researches on the development of HMR using local agricultural products has been being promoted in Cheonan, Chungju, and Jeju in 2020. In the case of Jeju, it has been prepared and realized the B2B commercialization of Jeju agricultural products in connection with the convenience store ingredients supplier in the province. In the case of Cheonan, development of HMR foods like as Sundae, dumpling, sausage, and Tteokgalbi using willd chive, cherry tomatoes, shiitake mushroom, fortified perilla, and licopene fortified watermelon has been being promoted. Lastly, in the case of Chungju, a diverse HMR foods have been developed using beans, centella asatica, Japanese lady bell, apples and peaches such as blended juices, frozen boiled rice, and tofu kit. In the future, in connection with the regional specialized crop cultivation project promoted by the Rural Development Administration, we intend to support the convergence commercialization of R&D technology based on regional characteristics.
