“I was able to take my mother on our first family trip together with my electric wheelchair.”
These ‘Green Trip’ reminiscences are from Park Jin-sik, a wheelchair user who, in 2018, was able to enjoy a leisurely trip with his family.

‘Green Trip’ is a CSR project by Kia, in partnership with the non-profit organization Green Light, aimed at allowing people with disabilities to travel freely.

Traveling comes with a number of restrictions for people with disabilities, including cost and a lack of accessible transportation and facilities. According to a 2021 survey by the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism and a 2022 survey by the Korea Disabled People’s Development Institute, 93.9% of non-disabled South Koreans over 15 years old have experience traveling domestically, while the same is true for only 15.7% of South Koreans with disabilities. This vividly depicts the significant barriers that people with disabilities face when attempting to travel.

In response to this, Kia, as a socially responsible company, launched ‘Green Trip’ to help create ‘a world where people with disabilities have freedom of movement’ and protect ‘the right to free travel for those with limited mobility.’

People with disabilities often tend to associate travel primarily with ‘inconvenience.’ To address this reality, ‘Green Trip’ aims to make travel safe and convenient from start to finish. To achieve this, Kia has equipped all associated vehicles with hand controllers, allowing them to be driven by people with disabilities.

Additionally, Kia offers a range of vehicles to choose from, including ramp-equipped vehicles for easy wheelchair boarding, tracker-type vehicles for transporting wheelchairs, and vehicles with electric rotating seats for easier boarding.

Since the service began in 2012, a total of 93,910 people have traveled over 5.9 million kilometers using ‘Green Trip.’ This includes 42,231 people with disabilities who have been able to experience traveling freely with their companions.

The support provided by ‘Green Trip’ is not limited to vehicles; a wide variety of travel itineraries based on different themes and tailored to diverse situations are also offered. For example, the ‘Mission Travel’ itinerary provides vehicles, drivers, and recreational expenses to selected applicants. Recently, Kia has collaborated with the Korea National Park Service to offer mountain exploration itineraries for people with disabilities, including visits to Jirisan Mountain and Sobaeksan Mountain.

‘Green Trip’ continues to expand its service area. The project has recently expanded to the Daegu region and currently operates eight offices across South Korea, providing opportunities for people with disabilities to travel nationwide. Additionally, Kia has collaborated with KBS1 radio on a public service campaign, ‘Let’s Go on a Green Trip,’ and held an event where 240 people with disabilities were invited to the Gwangju-Kia Champions Field.

The ‘Green Trip’ project involves not only helping people with disabilities to travel, but also working to improve social awareness and accessibility to cultural sites. What does this project mean to people with disabilities? From a family who took their first trip to Jeju Island with their child with developmental disabilities, to a daughter who was able to travel to Daegu with her mother who uses a wheelchair, to a mother who was able to accompany her son to the hospital, ‘Green Trip’ has achieved an extremely high level of satisfaction among users. A survey found that 95.9% reported positive changes in their lives after their experiences with the service.

Through ‘Green Trip,’ Kia is going beyond simply assisting people with disabilities to travel, and is working to provide them with opportunities to change their lives.