“There are even people who wait to ‘glean’ before the harvest is finished. It is not respectful to farmers who have worked hard to grow their crops.” Mr. Moon (62), who farms potatoes in Hoecheon-m...
Conflicts continue across rural areas during the harvest season for potatoes·onions and more ‘Unauthorized gleaning is theft’ banners also appear Professional pickers hurt farmers…“Beware of theft charges” On the 31st, a banner reading ‘Gleaning is theft’ hangs on a road in Hoecheon-myeon, Boseong-gun, South Jeolla.
The agricultural cooperative, the police substation, and the township office put it up after repeated harm to farmers. Kang Hyun-Seok.
“There are even people who wait to ‘glean’ before the harvest is finished. It is not respectful to farmers who have worked hard to grow their crops.
” Mr. Moon , who farms potatoes in Hoecheon-myeon, Boseong-gun, South Jeolla, is plagued every year around this time by people trying to take leftover potatoes after the harvest. As soon as the work ends, they enter the field without permission and bag potatoes that were left unharvested.
Some even wear work clothes and bring hand hoes. They rummage through plots to find fallen potatoes. Mr. Moon said, “It is hard enough to sell carefully grown crops at a fair price, and to see city people snooping around the fields to ‘save a few bucks’ honestly makes me angry.
” Rural areas that have entered the peak harvest season for broccoli, potatoes, onions, and garlic are struggling with outsiders who come to do ‘gleaning’ without permission. On the 31st, across Hoecheon-myeon in Boseong-gun, banners reading ‘Gleaning prohibited’ put up by the agricultural cooperative, the township office, and the police substation are hanging.
They state the sentence along with the message ‘Unauthorized gleaning is punishable as theft,’ but it does not help. According to the National Police Agency, there were 619 theft cases involving agricultural and livestock products nationwide in 2024, with Gyeonggi Province recording the most at 94, followed by rural regions such as South Gyeongsang , South Jeolla , North Gyeongsang , and North Chungcheong .
‘Gleaning,’ in which neighbors dig up produce that is slightly less marketable or not yet fully harvested, was akin to the countryside tradition of generosity. However, as instances of outsiders taking crops have become frequent in recent years, many say it has crossed the line.
Hoecheon-myeon is known for spring broccoli and potatoes. From April to June, the broccoli and potato harvest is in full swing, and theft cases have recently occurred one after another here.
Broccoli is a ‘multiple-harvest’ crop, as side shoots keep growing after the main heads are cut, allowing sequential harvests. Outsiders unaware of this have been caught picking broccoli before the harvest is actually finished.
One farmer cultivating broccoli in a field near the road said they had been victimized five times. The farmer let the people go without reporting them to the police because they explained, “We thought the harvest was over.
” There are also ‘pros’ who travel from place to place in step with harvest seasons to glean. In areas such as Muan, where onions are widely grown, and Goheung, known for garlic, onion·garlic gleaning pros appear every year. They sometimes sell the produce they take to restaurants or grocery stores.
Jeong Sang-hwan, managing director at the Hoecheon branch of the agricultural cooperative, said, “Among those who roam in groups of three or four to glean professionally, some resell the produce they take or bring it to the cooperative to ship by courier,” adding, “It hurts farmers. ” Gleaning that goes beyond neighborly generosity can be punished as the crime of theft.
Attorney Park Tae-sik stated, “Entering a field and taking crops without the permission of the owner constitutes theft, so caution is required. ” 한글기사 원본
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