Chairman Choi Jong-ku of the Financial Services Commission(FSC).

The government plans to plow up to 40 trillion won in the coming years into areas related to the 4th Industrial Revolution, including such sectors as smart factories, drones and self-driving cars. The government will also entirely do away with the joint surety, or co-guarantee system, to spur the creation of startups and venture businesses by the first half next year so they can go about their business without the fear of failure.

In a report on major policies to the president, the Financial Services Commission (FSC) said boundaries for its financial policies will be “productive and inclusive financing with the financing the 4th Industrial Revolution as the center of its policies.”

The financial authority will guide government-owned financial institutions, including Korea Development Bank, Korea Credit Guarantee Fund and other policy loan institutions to supply sectors related to the 4th Industrial Revolution. Government funds for investment will be boosted to 40 trillion won in the next four years from the current 20 trillion won to create 60,000 new jobs by 11,000 industrial firms.

The FSC will touch up the current loan provision system at the financial institutions so that more loans are provided to reformative and productive business firms, instead of them heavily relying on household and real estate loans. The FSC will change the calculation method of the own capital ratios of the financial institutions based on the BIS standard. The FSC will also lower interest rates for savings bank loans by cutting the maximum interest rates on loans to 24 percent per annum from 27 percent, and ultimately down to 20 percent in the near future.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution is expected to create up to 585,000 jobs over the next 10 years in 12 new industrial sectors, with augmented reality and virtual reality leading growth, according to two state-run institutes. The projection from research by the Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade and the Korea Institute for Advancement of Technology is in stark contrast to widespread speculation that the fourth industrial revolution will lead to fewer jobs.

The 12 new industries are: internet of things-based home appliances; electric autonomous vehicles; robots; drones; biotechnology and healthcare; premium consumer goods; high-tech new materials; VR and AR; next-generation semiconductors; next-generation displays; eco-friendly ships, and energy.

The jobs in those industries will account for 11.5 percent of total employment in 2025, up from 4.5 percent in 2015.

Premium consumer goods will create the most jobs, or 136,500, up 6.3 percent during the period, followed by robots with 83,900 jobs and energy with 67,800. In terms of average annual growth, the AR and VR areas are expected to expand by 32.2 percent a year through 2025, compared with 2.8 percent in 2015, the institutes noted. They said the two sectors could create around 45,400 jobs, up from 2,800 in 2015.

The projection came as AR is sweeping the nation with the release of "Pokemon Go," a GPS-based AR mobile game whose number of users topped 7 million a week after the game's launch.

The growth rates of eco-friendly ships, drones and electric autonomous vehicles are also expected to be more than 20 percent.

There are concerns that the fourth industrial revolution could reduce jobs, but they were mainly because there were not enough reviews on new industries. "Due to the advanced technology, it is inevitable for blue-collar workers to lose jobs, but there will be new jobs in newly emerging sectors," an official of the Korea Economic Research Institute noted.