Following the return to in-person classes, violence in schools has increased this year, a government survey showed. In the survey by the Education Ministry, 1.7 percent of students said they suffered violence in schools in 2022, up 0.6 percentage point from last year, when most schools shifted classes online due to COVID-19. The number is 0.1 percentage point higher than in 2019, before the pand...

Monthly sales of K-pop albums surpassed a combined 10 million for the first time in July thanks to the continued expansion of the global fandoms of idol groups, a market tracker said. According to Kim Jin-woo, head researcher of Circle Chart, which reports accumulated sales and streams, combined sales of the nation’s top 400 physical albums reached 10,827,324 copies in July, a 40.2 percent jum...

South Korea’s rice paddy area inched down 0.7 percent in 2022 from last year, as farmers opted to grow other crops due to falling prices of the staple grain, data showed. The country’s rice cultivation area came to 727,158 hectares - slightly more than half the size of the US state of Connecticut - this year, compared to 732,477 hectares a year earlier, according to the data compiled by Statis...

Global TV sales fell more than 6 percent from a year prior in the first half of this year on slow demand and macroeconomic woes, research showed, as Samsung Electronics remained the top player in the TV segment. Across the globe, 92.6 million TVs were sold, down 6.6 percent from a year earlier. By value, the decrease was sharper at 12.5 percent, according to industry tracker Omdia. Consumer ...

Marijuana use by young Americans reached record levels last year, and the use of hallucinogens is also on the rise, according to a new study. Forty-three percent of 5,000 young adults between 19 and 30 years old surveyed reported marijuana use within the past year in 2021, up from 34 percent in 2016 and 29 percent in 2011, the Monitoring the Future study by the University of Michigan found. ...

About two-thirds of South Koreans are opposed to a proposed bill that would ban the recording of phone calls without consent, on the belief that such recordings can be used to protect themselves or for public good, such as whistleblowing, a survey showed. A group of ruling People Power Party lawmakers, led by Rep. Yoon Sang-hyun, has proposed the bill to ban recording phone calls without the c...

Nearly 9 out of every 10 South Koreans hold a favorable view of the United States, the second-highest rating among 17 countries surveyed, a poll showed. In the poll conducted by the Pew Research Center, 89 percent of Koreans surveyed said they hold a favorable view toward the US, the second-highest rating after Poland with 91 percent. The survey showed more than 80 percent of South Koreans t...

Foldable smartphone shipments are expected to hit 16 million units this year, growing 73 percent from 9 million units last year, according to industry tracker Counterpoint Research. South Korean tech giant Samsung Electronics continued to lead the foldable category it created with the first Galaxy Fold device. China’s Huawei and Oppo came in a distant second and third. Samsung’s share of the...

South Korea’s Hyundai Motor Group said it ranked third in first-half global vehicle sales on the strength of high-end model sales, despite difficulties in the global supply of automotive chips. Hyundai Motor, its independent Genesis brand and Hyundai’s smaller affiliate Kia sold a combined 3.299 million vehicles in global markets in the January-June period, trailing only Toyota Motor’s 5.138 m...

After half a year of war in Ukraine, a slim majority of Americans agree that the United States should continue to support Kyiv until Russia withdraws all its forces, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll. The polling suggests continued support for US President Joe Biden‘s policy of backing Ukraine, despite economic worries and domestic political developments grabbing Americans’ attention i...

South Korea’s contraband trade shot up 60 percent in the first half of the year on a spike in tariff evasion and country-of-origin violations, the customs agency said. The Korea Customs Service said it detected and confiscated about 3 trillion won ($2.3 billion) worth of illegal goods and unlawful transactions in the January-June period, compared with 1.9 trillion won a year earlier. Yet the...

Massachusetts has been named the best state to live in the United States in a recent survey. WalletHub, a Washington-based personal finance website, has ranked the 50 states’ “livability” according to their affordability, economy, education and health, quality of life and safety in 2022. Massachusetts topped the list garnering 62.65 points out of 100. The state ranked first in “education and...

Tottenham Hotspur’s South Korean forward Son Heung-min was included on the list of 30 finalists for the 2022 Ballon d’Or. Son was named on France Football’s annual list for the second time after his nomination in 2019. Before Son, Korea’s Seol Ki-hyeon, who played in the Belgian soccer league and Park Ji-sung, a former Manchester United midfielder, made the list in 2002 and 2005, respectively....

South Korea’s exports of instant noodles hit a fresh all-time high in the first half of the year amid the increasing popularity of Korean pop culture and a rise in demand for home-cooked food, data showed. Exports of instant noodles, or “ramyeon” in Korean, came to $383.4 million in the January-June period, according to data from the food industry and the Korea Customs Service. The figure wa...

The number of bills and coins discarded due to severe damage shrank by 14.1 percent on-year in the first half amid an increasing prevalence of non-cash transactions, data showed. A total of 191.66 million damaged bills and coins were discarded in the January-June period, compared with 223.10 million tallied in the same period a year earlier, according to the data from the Bank of Korea. The ...