Korea’s industrial community on Tuesday raised its voice against a recent government move to raise electricity prices, arguing that a hike will place greater burdens on companies.

“An increase in the electricity rate is a huge burden for the entire industry, including small and mid-size firms as they face an economic slowdown,” Lim Sang-hyuk from the Federation of Korean Industries said in a forum. The FKI is the country’s biggest business lobbying group.

“There still is controversy over the calculation of electricity prices,” said Lim. “We should solve this problem prior to any rate hike.”

The state-run Korea Electric Power Corporation recently insisted that a price hike is inevitable because low domestic prices have caused an operational deficit of 8.5 trillion won ($7.4 billion) for the past four years.

Lim also argued that the industrial electricity rate has risen more than general and residential power prices.

“In the past 10 years, rates for industrial use jumped a whopping 61 percent, while prices for residential and general use rose 4.1 percent and 11.4 percent, respectively,” said the FKI official. 

(Yonhap News)