A few interesting statistics

The South Korean economy is weathering the on-going global recession better than many countries, and as its reputation and international standing grows, so does its foreign population. Here are some recent stats, given to UlsanOnline.com by the Ulsan Metropolitan Police Agency.

In the past 5 years, Ulsan’s foreign population has been steadily rising, from about 12,500 in 2007 to 19,350 as of Sept. 2012. That’s just under 2% of the population in this city of 1.1 million. When you consider how many of those people are here only for a year or two at a time, as migrant labourers, students, ESL teachers or engineers, that means a lot more people are actually coming and going through the city.

Many people are aware that the largest group of foreign nationals in Korea are Chinese, so it’s unsurprising that the Chinese population of Ulsan is the largest with almost 8,000 people. The second largest group is from Vietnam with close to 3,000 Vietnamese people living in this city.  If you group all of the English speaking teachers, engineers and others (from countries like the US, the UK, etc.), together, there are 1 352 of us. Even if you include all the nations that consider English an official language, the total number of English speakers is only 2 758, still in 3rd place – something to keep in mind next time you gripe about the lack of written or spoken English in, say, the Immigration office.

Here’s a breakdown of the foreign community in Ulsan, percentage-wise: