TS Corporation CEO Kim Ki-young, left, poses with trade union leader Cho Joo-hui after agreeing to settle wage bargaining for this year without any disputes at its head office in Seoul on August 5. Photo courtesy of TS Corporation

Korea's top-tier food company free of labor disputes for 64 years

South Korea is notorious for the conflicts between the management and labor unions, which are typically regarded as highly militant. However, not all enterprises suffer from labor disputes.

TS Corporation, one of the country’s leading food companies, said on August 5 that the outfit’s unionists decided to trust the management to decide their wages for this year.

“The company chalked up solid results despite many challenges,” a TS union leader said. “Against this backdrop, we decided to ask the management to determine this year’s wage levels without collective bargaining.”

TS Corporation racked up 1.2 trillion won ($1.01 billion) in sales last year for an operating profit of 29.5 billion won ($25 million), which are almost the same as those of 2018.

In comparison, its 2019 net profit surged more than 50 percent year-on-year to 14.7 billion won ($12 million).

Founded in 1956, TS Corporation is a first-tier food company of Korea, which focuses on such products as sugar, food, and animal feed. Over the past 64 years, the Seoul-based outfit has never experienced any labor disputes, according to TS.

Collective wage bargaining takes place once a year for most Korean firms, including TS Corporation.

TS CEO Kim Ki-young said that the company is determined to attain its mission of being “the most valuable company for the real happiness of customers” through management-labor collaboration.

“We are expanding our views to more future-oriented business, including biotechnology and genetic engineering as our long-term achievement,” the chief executive said.

“We believe that the accumulated experiences and authentic technical know-how will lead us to the new era of other achievements.”
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