The rapid loss of natural history specirnens in biology. geology and humanity along with an accelerated paæ of urbanization and industrialization in Korea would be deemed why the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is most urgently needed in this country. In order to improve the situation twenty six scientific societies and organizations in the nation launched a national campaign in 1991 organizing the Korean Commission for the Development of the National Museum of Natural History(KCDNMNH) . It urged the government to set up one. holding a variety of events including national as well as international symposia. special exhibition for lay public and interviews with daily newspapers. In June 1995 at length. the Ministry of Culture and Sport announced its decision of developing the NMNH and a series of planning study was carried out in the following three years covering subjects of basic planning of NMNH, land screening. specimen collection. exhibition development. and museum operation. The project came to a sudden halt. however. in 1998 with no budget at all. allegedly due to financial crisis of IMF. The project. then. was put to the feasibility study early 2001 by the new government and was subject to cost-effect analysis performed by the Korea Development Institute(KDI). a government supported institute for national development. The outcome. issued in July of the same year. turned out to be quite negative as it should not be a business of good pay-off. The report. nevertheless. concluded that NMNH should be set up on a long-term project in national need and reinitiated with a new planning in coordination with the concurrent projects of the Bio Resources Collection Center of the Ministry of Environrnent and the National Science Museurn Expansion Programme of the Ministry of Science and Technology, primarily to avoid any duplication of governrnental investment. The idea of the combinational approach was not realized at all, however, apparently due to the well known obstacles and difficulties conventionally seen from joint projects between different ministries. It was to make a breakthrough in this situation that the Korean Association for the Study of Natural History Museurns (KASNHM, successor to KCDNMNH) presented a petition in August in 2001 to President Kim Dae Jung to make a coordination among the three different ministerial projects. A few meetings were held to that end by the Presidential Commission on Policy Planning as well as by the Office of the President for Education and Culture. They did not get through, however, coordinating the three ministerial interests in making their projects of their own, allegedly due to different objectives and functions of the respective projects. A new stance was taken by KASNHM this time, making appeal to presidential candidates of the three parties in competition near the end of 2002. One of the candidate, Mr. Rho Moo Hyun, made it public that he would surely set up the National Museurn of Natural History if elected the 16th President of the Republic. The result turned out quite rosy and full of hope because Mr.Rho was finally won the presidential election and took power next year. The scientists involved in KASNHM still kept making their efforts of persuading governrnent officials to make any advanæ with the project. No progress has been made, notwithstanding, so far sinæ no budget was made available for the project. KASNHM held, this time, an intemational symposiurn and adopted a recommendation to the Korean Govemment on the occasion of ICOM 2004 Seoul Conference held in October. The recommendation was supported by 42 scientific and natural history related societies as well as institutes and sent to govemment agencies including the Presidential offie . The Ministry of Culture and Tourism still keeps announcing their plan of developing the NMNH but only in paper for a couple of years ever after. When will it get budget? still remains the question. It is quite striking thatlocal projects of exhibitional programme obtain budgets from the central government without difficulty. owing to the efforts devotedly made by the National Assembly men from that local areas. that is. for voters. The NMNH project is disregarded. by contrast. with nothing to do with votes. that is. there exists no master interested in NMNH project. In any case of either procuring budget or not. the development of the NMNH will be actively pursued and promoted as it is not merely the national center of preserving and studying natural heritage and its relation to humanity but also the symbol of national identity and pride in this period of fast accelerating pace of land decay and globalization.