Senior workforce agency partners with Goodwill Store to create inclusive jobs for elderly and disabled workers

The Korea Senior Human Resources Development Institute signed an MOU with Goodwill Store on Thursday at the Goodwill Store Siksa logistics center in Goyang to create socially inclusive jobs that bring together elderly and disabled workers.

The agreement aims to generate new employment opportunities that draw on the experience and capabilities of older adults, while expanding a mutually beneficial job model in which seniors work alongside people with developmental disabilities and other vulnerable groups.

Under the MOU, the two organizations agreed to cooperate on creating socially integrated jobs pairing workers with disabilities and senior job participants, planning and running education programs to strengthen participants' capabilities, linking each organization's networks and facilities, and providing budget support for program operations.

The initiative will be carried out at the Goodwill Store logistics center, where senior job participants support workers with developmental disabilities and jointly handle logistics tasks such as sorting and managing donated goods. It will be promoted as a leading model for leveraging senior capabilities.

The senior capability utilization model combines senior employment budgets with external resources to help prevent social problems and expand social services in areas such as the environment, caregiving and public service linkages.

Eleven senior job participants will take part in the program, handling tasks inside the logistics center including managing donated goods and sorting products, while supporting workers with disabilities in carrying out their duties smoothly.

The two organizations plan to use the agreement as a springboard to identify additional job models where elderly and disabled people can work together, and to continue cooperating toward creating social value and expanding sustainable employment.

Kim Su-young, president of the Korea Senior Human Resources Development Institute, said the agreement is significant as a new socially integrated job model in which elderly and disabled people work together by drawing on each other's strengths. "We will continue to identify diverse jobs where seniors can use their experience and capabilities to work alongside vulnerable groups, and create the social value that local communities need," Kim said.