Hwaseong Special City Operates 'Rice Miracle Healing Recipe' Using Suyang Rice…Cultivating Therapeutic Agriculture

Hwaseong Special City (Mayor Jeong Myeong-geun) has developed and begun pilot operations of its own therapeutic agriculture program for people with disabilities and workers at disability-related organizations, utilizing the region's agricultural resource 'Suyang Rice.'

This program is conducted using 'Rice Miracle Healing Recipe Made from Our Rice,' a therapeutic agriculture program developed by the Hwaseong City Agricultural Technology Center by connecting Suyang Rice, a local specialty product, with food culture content.

The city launched this project to foster therapeutic agriculture practitioners and therapeutic farm owners as professional instructors, while establishing a foundation to continuously operate therapeutic agriculture programs utilizing regional agricultural resources.

On September 3rd, therapeutic agriculture practitioners and therapeutic farm representatives who completed healing recipe training conducted a pilot program at the Hwaseong City Therapeutic Agriculture Support Center for 10 workers from a special school.

One special school worker who participated in the program said, "I have always been in a position of caring for students with disabilities, but participating in today's program felt like my weary heart was being filled again," and added, "I was able to feel that I myself am a valued person."

Following the operation targeting special school workers, the city will conduct pilot programs for people with disabilities a total of 4 times from September 7th through November 27th. The programs will be implemented sequentially with 4 disability welfare facilities in the region.

Song Seong-ho, director of the Hwaseong City Agricultural Technology Center, said, "Through this program that combines Suyang Rice, a regional agricultural resource, with food culture, we have confirmed the potential for therapeutic agriculture to provide emotional stability and rest opportunities for people with disabilities and workers at related organizations," and added, "We will carefully analyze feedback and evaluation results from the field to develop it into a region-specific therapeutic agriculture program utilizing Hwaseong's agricultural resources."