An eight-day trucker strike in South Korea ended Tuesday after negotiators and the union reached agreements to extend pay guarantees.
The strike had local economic impacts in South Korea but had yet to spread globally, according to news reports.
But the strike crippled ports and industrial hubs, causing more than $1.2 billion in lost output through delayed shipments from autos to petrochemicals and spirits, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.
"The Cargo Truckers Solidarity Union will immediately return to work, and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport will make utmost efforts so that truckers can return to work," the union said in a statement.
There was also a reported effort to extend minimum pay guarantees and possible expansion of fuel subsidies for truckers "in order to ease truckers' difficulties from recent rise in oil prices."
The relatively quick resolution of the strike appears to have avoided the potential havoc that small businesses were concerned about.
