South Korea's past village-based development campaign will provide an exemplary model for poor countries' rural development essential for their economic growth, a ranking official at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said Thursday. Mario Pezzini, who heads the OECD's Development Centre, made the remarks in a ceremony to launch a joint project to study Seoul's successful development policy. This is the OECD's first mission to study cases of rural area development in a developing nation.