South Korea’s government is planning a massive US$23.3bn (€20bn, £15.3bn) investment into four separate mega-projects aimed at boosting the country’s tourism industry.

As part of the initiative by South Korea’s ministries of finance, tourism and land, as well as other government agencies, US$16bn (€13.7bn, £10.5bn) will be spent “promptly” in a bid to attract the remaining US$7.3bn (€6.3bn, £4.8bn) required in new investments for the construction of hotels, resorts and theme parks in the country.

According to Asian broadcaster Arirang, the first of the four projects would see land in the US Army's Yongsan Garrison situated in central Seoul redeveloped as a tourism hub. The second will develop land formerly used as the Korea Electric Power Corporation’s headquarters, while there are also plans to build two destination resorts at seaside locations with investment targets each of around US$930m (€800m, £613m).

In all of the new resorts, the plans call for hotels, conference halls, fine dining, shopping malls, leisure and sports facilities, medical facilities and foreigner-only casinos.

The government is also aiming to attract funds to expand the number of hotels nationwide, to cope with the increasing number of foreign tourists visiting each year.

Speaking at a press conference, Park Min-kwon, policy director for the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said that South Korea was expecting US$1bn (€860m, £659m) to soon be available for the construction of around 5,000 new hotel rooms by the end of 2017.

In addition, South Korea is planning to open four duty free shops – three in Seoul and one on Jeju Island – and will dedicate six high-tech centres to urban areas, build new theme parks and develop the country’s scenic coastal regions.