[00:00.100]From VOA Special English,
[00:02.760]this is the Economics Report.
[00:06.200]North and South Korea reopened
[00:09.280]their joint factory zone this week.
[00:11.870]Lines of trucks and cars
[00:14.910]crossed South Korea's northern border Monday
[00:18.840]on the way to Kaesong, North Korea.
[00:22.120]About 800 South Korean workers and their supervisors
[00:27.750]entered the jointly operated Kaesong Industrial Complex.
[00:33.370]They brought materials and parts
[00:36.560]to restart production for the first time in months.
[00:41.840]South Korean managers expressed happiness at returning to work.
[00:48.270]Ji Yoon-tae is deputy chief of a South Korean company in Kaesong.
[00:55.490]He says it has been very hard
[00:59.170]while the factories were closed.
[01:01.660]From now on, he says,
[01:04.290]he hopes everything works out well,
[01:06.880]and the factory zone comes back to life.
[01:10.120]In April, North Korea removed about 53,000 workers
[01:16.200]from the joint manufactoring effort.
[01:19.580]Their withdrawl resulted from military tensions
[01:23.760]with South Korea and the United States.
[01:27.740]South Korean companies say they lost about $1 billion
[01:33.370]from the suspension of factories.
[01:36.060]The industrial area produces cloths, watches,
[01:40.990]and parts for electronic products.
[01:44.400]After months of negotiations,
[01:47.630]the two Koreas last week reached a deal to reopen the area.
[01:53.450]They agreed to set up a joint committee to settle future problems.
[01:59.790]Officials from the two sides have been holding weekly meetings
[02:04.820]to discuss other details.
[02:07.560]The reopening is seen as the most important sign of
[02:11.840]warming relations between North and South Korea
[02:16.270]since the North carried out missile and nuclear tests.
[02:21.500]Choi Kyong-lim is South Korea's Deputy Minister of
[02:27.580]Trade, Industry and Energy.
[02:30.970]He told reporters in Seoul that the government
[02:35.060]hopes many Chinese companies will invest in Kaesong.
[02:39.830]He says it is important for Chinese companies
[02:44.110]to use North Korean labor at Kaesong
[02:47.260]where pay is low but productivity is high.
[02:52.240]China is North Korea's closest ally.
[02:56.970]It also is believed to have some limited influence
[03:02.100]over the government in Pyongyang.
[03:05.230]Cho Bong-hyun is with the Economic Research Center of
[03:11.060]the Industrial Bank of Korea.
[03:14.390]He says Kaesong offers better guarantees
[03:19.520]than other investments in North Korea.
[03:22.560]He says investment in other cities has more risk.
[03:28.390]And that's the Economics Report from VOA Learning English.