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South Korea Telecommunications
Communications services improved dramatically in the 1980s
with the assistance of foreign partners and as a result of the
development of the electronics industry. The number of telephones
in use in 1987 reached 9.2 million, a considerable increase from
1980, when there were 2.8 million subscribers (which, in turn,
was four times the number of subscribers in 1972).
Radio, and in more recent years television, reached virtually
every resident
(see The Media
, ch. 4). The Japanese established a
radio station in Seoul in 1927; by 1945 there were about 60,000
radio sets in the country. By 1987 there were approximately 42
million radio receivers in use, and more than 100 radio stations
were broadcasting. Transistor radios and television sets have
made their way to the most remote rural areas. Television sets,
now mass-produced in South Korea, became far less expensive; most
city people and a significant number of rural families owned or
had access to a television. Ownership of television sets grew
from 25,000 sets when broadcasting was initiated in 1961 to an
estimated 8.6 million sets in 1987, and more than 250 television
stations were broadcasting.
Data as of June 1990
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