KUALA LUMPUR - Gyeonggi Province in South Korea will roll out an artificial intelligence-based “Migrant Portal” this year to help foreign residents navigate residency issues and access essential information without visiting administrative offices.

The provincial government said on January 21 that the portal is designed to assist migrants who feel lost due to unfamiliarity with visa extensions, healthcare access, education services and other aspects of daily life, as reported by The Asia Business Daily.

At the core of the platform is a generative AI chatbot trained on frequently asked questions related to residency status, labour and everyday living.

Instead of relying on keyword searches, the chatbot will interpret users’ intent and provide tailored, real-time responses, making information more accessible to migrants unfamiliar with administrative terminology and systems.

Real-time multilingual services powered by Google Translate will be applied across the portal, while the system will be built as a responsive web platform accessible via PCs and smartphones without requiring a separate app.

A community feature will also be introduced, allowing migrants to share information on daily life through spaces organised by nationality and region.

Users will be able to exchange experiences related to healthcare, education and local events, while location-based services will guide them to nearby hospitals, schools and support programmes based on their place of residence.

The portal will integrate information on foreigner-related policies and support projects currently scattered across ministries, local governments and related agencies.

By linking data from migrant support centres, counselling cases and civil complaint processes, the province aims to provide a single access point for all necessary information.

Gyeonggi Province is home to the largest number of foreign residents in South Korea, with 840,000 of the country’s 2.58 million immigrants residing there as of November 2024, accounting for about 32.7 per cent of the total.

As the number of migrants continues to rise across industrial sites and communities, the province said policy responses are increasingly needed in areas such as safety, labour, healthcare, housing and education.

Governor Kim Dong-yeon has previously identified migrant worker issues as a top policy priority, alongside industrial safety, following the Hwaseong factory fire recovery efforts in June 2024.

In response, the province established the country’s first Immigrant Society Bureau in July 2024 to oversee migrant-related policies.

The Migrant Portal is a key digital initiative launched under the new bureau, extending field-based migrant support services into the online space.

The portal is scheduled for official launch in May.

“The Migrant Portal will serve as a foundation where all policies and support information for migrants in the province can be accessed in one place.

“We will lower language and information barriers so that these policies can be truly experienced in daily life,” said Yoon Hyeonok, director of Immigrant Society Policy at Gyeonggi Province.