Hyundai Engineering holds bee garden school for employees' families

Hyundai Engineering announced Monday that it held an ecological education program offering urban beekeeping experiences for employees and their families.

The program, called the Bee Garden School, is part of the company's corporate social responsibility initiative "Gift House Plan Bee," which aims to preserve biodiversity in urban areas. Developed in partnership with Urban Bees Seoul, an urban beekeeping social venture, the program gave employees' children a chance to observe bee ecology firsthand and learn about the importance of restoring urban ecosystems.

The program ran twice — on June 6 and July 4 — at Plan Bee Garden No. 2 inside Boramae Park in Dongjak-gu, Seoul. A total of 84 participants from 27 employee households took part.

Participants toured the Plan Bee garden before assembling wooden structures to build "bee hotels," small shelters designed to house wild bees. They then put on protective suits to observe beehives at the urban apiary and harvested honey themselves.

One participating employee said the experience offered a new perspective on urban nature. "By observing bees up close — insects I had always passed by without a second thought — I was able to truly understand the importance of urban ecosystems and what biodiversity conservation really means," the employee said.

Gift House Plan Bee is Hyundai Engineering's flagship social responsibility program, focused on creating bee habitats in urban areas to support biodiversity. Last year, the company established its first Plan Bee garden at Bukseoul Dream Forest in Gangbuk-gu, and this year opened a second garden at Boramae Park in Dongjak-gu, introducing a combined 200,000 bees across both sites.

The program also provides urban beekeeping vocational training to people with borderline intellectual functioning who fall outside conventional welfare support, helping them achieve social independence. The initiative reflects Hyundai Engineering's broader social responsibility philosophy of helping beneficiaries become self-reliant and grow through the expansion of space and energy values.

"The Bee Garden School was a meaningful opportunity for employees' families to experience the value of nature directly in a space that embodies our company's social contribution philosophy," a Hyundai Engineering official said. "We plan to continue developing a variety of programs for future generations using the Plan Bee gardens."

Hyundai Engineering recently launched "Plan Bee Honey," harvested from the Plan Bee garden, through a Naver Happy Bean crowdfunding campaign. The campaign, supported by both employees and the general public, reached 10 times its funding goal, with all proceeds donated to the Justicepice Foundation.

Meanwhile, Hyundai Engineering has also been making strides in office supply in Seoul's central business district, recently completing the commercial facility Rene Square at Block 6 of Euljiro 3-ga.