Gwinnett's global reach just got longer, as delegates from the Georgia county visited South Korea to formally enter into a sister community agreement with a prosperous district of the country's capital.

Gwinnett County Commission Chairman Charles Bannister signed the pact at a June 29 ceremony with Maeng Jung-ju, mayor of Gangnam-gu, a trend-setting, cosmopolitan Seoul district known as a leader in information technology and education.

The agreement is the first of its kind for Gwinnett. Before its implementation, the county created a special ordinance to lay out seven criteria that potential sister communities must meet, said Nick Masino, vice president of economic development for the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce.

Gangnam exceeded those requirements, Mr. Masino said. One of 25 Seoul districts, Gangnam is located south of the Han River that snakes throughout the city. The district has about 560,000 people and is home to the Korea World Trade Center, upscale shopping malls, the huge COEX convention center and many corporate offices and apartment buildings.

The agreement comes nearly two years after Mr. Maeng made his first visit to Gwinnett in May 2007. It commits both communities to fostering educational exchanges, sharing expertise and exploring economic cooperation.

“I hope that today's sister city signing ceremony will serve as a milestone for the peoples of both competitive and attractive cities and to stimulate exchange between the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce and the Gangnam-gu Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the revitalization of each other's economies within this worldwide economic recession,” Mr. Maeng said at the signing.

Gwinnett officials also emphasized that this is more than just a gesture of goodwill. The Korea stop comes at the tail end of a two-week Asia trip aimed at building business ties. Gwinnett officials spent 10 days in China, where they announced that Chinese appliance manufacturer Hisense USA Corp. would expand in Gwinnett.

The Gangnam friendship could likely lead to similar developments, they said.

“This is more than a signing,” said Gwinnett Chamber President Jim Maran, noting the two-year relationship that led to the day's events.

Mr. Maran has traveled to South Korea about 50 times. He worked as a Motorola executive for 31 years, much of that time in Asia. Korean companies looking to enter the U.S. market would benefit from landing in Gwinnett, he said.

“The reason Korean companies are coming to Georgia is because they want to expand into the marketplace, and they can utilize Gwinnett County as a center base of operations and expand into retail or software, anything,” he said, citing the new Hisense research and development center. “The reason people move to Georgia is access to the rest of the world. It's the best location.”

Mr. Masino said the strength of Gwinnett's Korean community was the catalyst for the Gangnam relationship. The county has about half of Georgia's Korean population, which the chamber estimated at about 83,000 in 2008. Those connections led the chamber to Gangnam, he said.

“We didn't know where Gangnam was three years ago, but because of the great Korean-Americans in Gwinnett County and all of Atlanta, (Gangnam) actually approached us,” Mr. Masino said.

Jay Eun, president of the Korean-American Assocation of Greater Atlanta, helped orchestrate the survey on which the chamber bases its statistics.

He accompanied the delegation and gave the Gangnam leadership a presentation at the signing ceremony on metro Atlanta's Korean community.

While Georgia is home to branches of large Korean companies like Kia Motors Corp., Kumho Tire, LG and others, most Koreans in metro Atlanta are engaged in small businesses like laundry services and convenience stores, Mr. Eun said. He added there are hundreds of Korean-owned liquor stores, beauty supply shops and restaurants in Gwinett County, which has a population of about 800,000.

Mr. Masino said connections like Mr. Eun and James Song, president of the Korean-American Chamber of Commerce of Georgia and another delegate, will continue to be valuable in Gwinnett's global efforts.

“What we've found at Gwinnett County economic development in all of our international opportunities is that it's the people we know in Gwinnett that have the international experience and background, and we utilize those relationships to expand,” he said.

There was no red carpet to guide chamber officials and other delegates into Gangnam's city hall, but a banner posted above the front entrance used Korean and English to offer a hearty welcome. Greeters waited with flowers as delegates got off their bus.

After viewing a presentation an e-government system that Gangnam has put in place to give citizens access to government services and forms through their home televisions, the delegates were escorted into a long conference room. Gangnam representatives sat at tables opposite the Gwinnett delegates. All places were marked by cards inscribed with name and title.

A five-piece brass band belted “Georgia on My Mind” and a Korean folk song as well as both countries' national anthems to start the ceremony after Mayor Maeng and Mr. Bannister entered and sat down at the head table.

After a gift exchange and official signing, Mr. Bannister presented Mr. Maeng with certificate granting him honorary citizenship in Gwinnett County.

Mr. Bannister noted that Gwinnett could learn from Gangnam's use of technology to conveniently engage its citizens. Mr. Maeng said Gangnam's technological expertise has attracted some 3,000 observers and IT professionals from more than 60 countries.

“You have some great things that we don't have in Gwinnett County and Georgia, which tells me that we still have some learning to do, but we will work hard at it,” Mr. Bannister said.

After the signing ceremony, Kim Hi-yong, president of the Gangnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, hosted a dinner for the delegation to discuss business opportunities and the similarities between Gangnam and Gwinnett.

He told GlobalAtlanta at the dinner not to be fooled by Gangnam's skyscrapers, high-rise apartment buildings and company headquarters. Although the corporate offices and trade towers are important for attracting business, education built Gangnam and will continue to be its economic engine, he said.

Gangnam was orchard land 25 years ago, he said. Downtown Seoul, north of the river, was getting too crowded, so city leaders decided to expand southward, Mr. Kim said. (“Gangnam” literally means “south of the river.”)

“Those days Gangnam was very weak, but about 20 years ago they moved some of the schools to the south, and people realized Gangnam was the best school zone, so people started moving here, apartments started building up. The apartments were booming and companies started following, so that's how it started,” he said.

Mothers' desire to see their children succeed is “the driving force of Gangnam,” which has a per capita income of about $80,000, 300 percent higher than Korea's average of about $20,000.

Those aspects are similar to Gwinnett's strengths, Mr. Masino said. Thirty years ago Gwinnett was also largely occupied by farmland. Now the county is home to three Fortune 500 companies including NCR Corp., which this month announced that it would move its headquarters to Gwinnett, as Mr. Masino told Mr. Kim.

Gwinnett also has the largest public school system in Georgia, with more than 150,000 students, and chamber officials regularly use the strength of that system as a selling point in economic development discussions.

Mr. Kim said he hopes to visit Georgia sometime within a year to follow up on the signing.

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