Safety and health disclosure in Korea: coverage, required information and correction procedures
A duty to disclose safety and health information every year
Employers above a specified size and the listed public-sector bodies must disclose safety and health information annually under Article 10-2 (Occupational Safety and Health Act). The information includes management arrangements, industrial accidents, activities and plans, investment, and recurrence-prevention measures and implementation plans. Its purpose and timing differ from an accident report submitted following an incident.
The regime took effect on 1 August 2026. Article 12-2 of the Enforcement Decree defines coverage, while Article 8-2 of the Enforcement Rule governs the disclosure procedure. An employer must establish whether it is covered, obtain confirmation by its representative, and post the information on the website designated by the Minister of Employment and Labor.
Preparation involves three separate questions: who has the duty, what must be disclosed, and when and how disclosure takes place. Satisfying one element does not satisfy the others. In particular, publication on a company website is not interchangeable with posting on the website designated by the Minister.
Government accident publication and employer disclosure are different
Under Article 10, the Minister may publish establishment-level accident counts, accident rates and related information to prevent industrial accidents. New Article 10-2 instead imposes an annual duty on covered employers and bodies to disclose their own safety and health information. The adjacent provisions have different publishing parties and information scopes.
Disclosure extends beyond accident outcomes. It includes the management system, prior-year activities, current-year plans, investment and recurrence prevention. Having no industrial accidents does not remove the other disclosure categories. Coverage and the content to be disclosed need separate consideration.
This procedure is also distinct from reporting to and obtaining approval from the board under Article 14. The wording of the disclosure procedure is confirmation by the representative. A safety and health plan reported to a board does not replace posting on the designated website; equally, the disclosure provision does not require a separate board resolution from every employer.
| Provision | Party | Main information or procedure |
|---|---|---|
| Act Article 10 | Minister | Publication of accident counts, rates and related information |
| Act Article 10-2 | Covered disclosing party | Annual disclosure of safety and health information |
| Rule Article 8-2 | Covered disclosing party | Representative confirmation and posting on the designated website |
The 500-worker threshold and annual construction value
For employers generally, the threshold is 500 or more regular workers. The Decree frames coverage in terms of the employer. It should not be rewritten as an exclusion based solely on the headcount at one location or as arbitrary aggregation across separate legal entities. Establish the employer and worker-count scope used in the coverage assessment.
For construction, the threshold is an employer with annual construction work valued at KRW 120 billion or more. This is annual construction value, not the value of one project. Substituting a project-value threshold or construction-capacity ranking used for another safety duty can produce a different coverage assessment.
The 500-worker and KRW 120 billion annual construction thresholds are not cumulative conditions. The parenthesis in Article 12-2(1) provides the construction-specific criterion. The provision does not itself list the headcount measurement period or detailed components of annual construction value. Before assessing coverage, examine the employer’s industry and the scope covered by its annual construction-value records.
Enforcement Decree Article 12-2(1) — Korean legal text
① 법 제10조의2제1항에 따라 안전보건 현황을 공시해야 하는 사업주는 상시근로자 수가 500명 이상인 사업주(건설업의 경우에는 연간 건설공사 금액이 1천200억원 이상인 사업주)로 한다.- 1 Employers generally500 or more regular workersAssess the disclosure threshold at employer level while keeping individual sites and separate legal entities distinct.
- 2 Construction employersAnnual construction value of at least KRW 120 billionthe test uses annual construction value, rather than one project’s value or a capacity ranking.
- 3 Listed public bodiesSeparately listed in Act Article 10-2Check separately listed public bodies independently of the 500-worker threshold for ordinary employers.
- 4 Contractors under Article 63Accident fatalities among subcontractors’ workers at the contractor’s establishmentthe additional category combines location, accident type and related subcontractor-worker conditions.
- 5 Public clients under Article 67Accident fatalities among contractors’ and subcontractors’ workers on commissioned constructionCheck whether the role is that of a construction client belonging to a public body listed in the Act.
Does the 500-worker threshold also apply to listed public bodies?
Article 10-2(1) separately lists public institutions under Article 4 of the Act on the Management of Public Institutions and local public corporations under Articles 49 and 76 of the Local Public Enterprises Act. Making their disclosure duty conditional again on the general 500-worker threshold could exclude bodies expressly listed in the Act.
Conversely, performing a public function does not put every organisation in these categories. Check its legal status against the cited provisions. Whether an entity is a private contractor, a listed public institution or a public construction client also affects the additional disclosure categories described below.
Separate the management system, previous activities and current plans
The safety and health management system concerns management roles and responsibilities. Prior-year activities and current-year plans refer to different periods. Describing completed work as a future plan, or presenting plans as completed performance, makes the actual position harder to understand.
Safety and health investment and recurrence-prevention measures and implementation plans are also separate disclosure categories. Spending money and implementing a preventive measure are not the same fact. Keep investment information distinct from the execution of preventive measures.
The Act lists these categories but does not set a minimum investment ratio or common budget formula here. A particular amount should not be made to appear to be a statutory standard. Nor should information about activities or plans be invented merely to fill a disclosure category.
Additional fatality information depends on the contracting role
A contractor required to take safety and health measures under Article 63 must additionally disclose fatalities among related subcontractors’ workers arising from accident-type industrial accidents at the contractor’s establishment. Location, accident type and the workers’ relationship all matter. This is not a category aggregating every injury at every trading partner.
A different category applies where a listed public institution or local public corporation is a construction client required to take prevention measures under Article 67. It covers fatalities among contractors’ and related subcontractors’ workers from accident-type industrial accidents in the construction work commissioned. Distinguish the role of contracting out work at an establishment from that of commissioning construction.
The accident-fatality limitation in these additional categories does not redefine the entire basic category of industrial accident information. Article 12-2(2) specifies additional matters under Article 10-2(1)6 of the Act. The public-client category concerns the commissioning role of the bodies listed in the Act. It does not cover every private construction client.
Obtain representative confirmation and disclose by 30 April
Covered parties must obtain confirmation of the information by their representative and disclose it by 30 April every year. Internal collation and representative confirmation are separate steps. Completion of departmental data collection does not establish that representative confirmation and posting on the designated website are complete.
Disclosure is made by posting on the website designated by the Minister. Posting only on an internal noticeboard or including the information in another report does not itself complete this procedure. Follow the designated website and guidance from the Ministry of Employment and Labor for the actual submission interface and detailed field requirements.
- 1 InformationManagement, accidents, activities and plans, investment and recurrence preventionRecord the previous year’s activities separately from the current year’s plans.
- 2 RepresentativeConfirmation before disclosureinternal collation, representative confirmation and board approval are separate procedures.
- 3 Annual deadlinethe annual 30 April deadline differs from commencement on 1 August 2026.
- 4 PublicationCheck the disclosure procedure on the website designated by the Minister.
- 5 Errors or verificationrequests address errors, omissions or verification; the provision sets no uniform response deadline.
Distinguish commencement of the duty from the recurring deadline. The regime commenced on 1 August 2026, while the annual deadline in the Rule is 30 April. Do not substitute these dates for each other when explaining reporting periods or preparation. The first disclosure cycle also requires checking the official implementation guidance.
Errors and omissions can lead to correction or supplementation requests
The Minister may request correction or supplementation where disclosed information contains errors or omissions or requires factual verification. The Minister may also request supporting documents. Disclosure is therefore not the end of any need to check the information.
An incorrect value, an omitted field and a matter requiring factual verification are different problems. Connect a request to the information concerned and the evidence supporting it. Do not dismiss a verification request on an unsupported assumption that the issue is merely typographical.
Article 8-2(2) establishes this power but does not specify a uniform number of days for every correction. Check the scope and deadline of the request and the procedure described in Ministry of Employment and Labor guidance. The fact that information was corrected does not by itself establish a particular violation or sanction.
Enforcement Rule Article 8-2(2) — Korean legal text
② 고용노동부장관은 제1항에 따라 공시된 안전보건 현황에 오류 또는 누락이 있거나 사실 확인이 필요한 경우에는 공시의무자에게 수정 또는 보완을 요청하거나 사실 확인을 위한 자료의 제출을 요청할 수 있다.Do not mix this duty with the 2027 and 2028 risk-assessment penalty dates
Article 1 of the Addenda to Act No. 21374 brought the disclosure provision and the penalty provision for non-disclosure into force on 1 August 2026. The 2027 and 2028 dates in the same Addenda phase in risk-assessment penalty provisions. They do not defer the disclosure duty until those years.
The risk-assessment penalty phases use thresholds of 50 regular workers and KRW 5 billion for construction projects. These differ from the disclosure thresholds of 500 workers and KRW 120 billion in annual construction value. Similar-looking numbers do not make the regimes or measurement scopes interchangeable.
For failure to disclose safety and health information in breach of Article 10-2(1), item 4(a-2) of Annex 35 to the Enforcement Decree sets the basic fine at KRW 10 million for the first, second, and third or subsequent violation. The statutory basis is Article 175(4)1-2 of the Act.
| Violation | First | Second | Third or subsequent |
|---|---|---|---|
| Failure to disclose safety and health information | 1,000 | 1,000 | 1,000 |
The table gives the specific basic amounts before reductions or other applicable rules. Item 1(c) allows the imposing authority to reduce an amount by up to one half for circumstances including substantial property loss from a natural disaster or fire, a serious business crisis, or the motive, consequences and extent of the violation. An offender in arrears on administrative fines cannot receive this item 1(c) reduction.
The size-based rule in item 3 applies 90%, 80% or 70% of the item 4 amount to workplaces within its bands: 90% for 50 to fewer than 100 regular workers, 80% for 10 to fewer than 50, and 70% for fewer than 10. For construction, the corresponding project-value bands are KRW 1 billion to less than KRW 4 billion, KRW 300 million to less than KRW 1 billion, and less than KRW 300 million. Do not substitute the disclosure thresholds of 500 workers or KRW 120 billion in annual construction value for these bands. Non-disclosure alone does not establish whether the size reduction applies or is excluded; the workplace or project must be assessed against item 3's size conditions.
Where item 1(c) and item 3 reductions overlap, the combined reduction cannot exceed half of the specific basic amount. Item 1(e) provides that an amount below KRW 1 million under the specific criteria is not reduced under either provision; if a reduction would bring it below KRW 1 million, KRW 1 million is imposed. Check the conditions in Annex 35 to the Enforcement Decree when distinguishing these basic amounts from the actual fine.