SEOUL –

South Koreans, Asia's biggest consumers of alcohol per capita, can now soothe themselves after a big night out with hangover-fighting ice cream.

A convenience store chain has launched the Gyeondyo bar, which translates as the "Hang in There bar." According to the company, it is the first ice cream bar marketed specifically to combat the aftereffects of alcohol consumption. It hit the shelves on Friday.

Drinking, often in groups of co-workers, is big business in South Korea. So are hangover cures, which generate 150 billion won ($126 million) in annual sales, according to industry data, ranging from pills and beverages to cosmetics for women who want to keep their skin soft after a boozy night.

Those cures exclude the "hangover soup" that is a staple of restaurant menus.

South Korea is exporting its remedies. Its most popular hangover beverage, Hut-gae Condition, made by a unit of the CJ Corp. conglomerate, has been sold in China, Japan and Vietnam since 2014. The drink also features in the popular 2014 music video "Hangover," by South Korean pop star Psy and U.S. rapper Snoop Dogg.

South Koreans each drink an average of 12.3 liters of alcohol per year, the most in the Asia-Pacific region, according to a 2014 World Health Organization report.

A study by South Korea's National Health Insurance Policy Institute estimated that the social cost of drinking — including to lost production, hospitalizations and early deaths — was about 9.45 trillion won ($8 billion) in 2013.

The ice cream bar's name "expresses the hardships of employees who have to suffer a working day after heavy drinking, as well as to provide comfort to those who have to come to work early after frequent nights of drinking," said a press release from the convenience store chain Withme FS, a unit of E-Mart Co. Ltd., part of the Shinsegae Group.

The grapefruit-flavored dessert contains 0.7 percent fruit juice from the Japanese raisin tree, a traditional hangover remedy that was cited in a 17th-century Korean medicine book and is included in popular hangover potions.

A 2012 article in the Journal of Neuroscience found that extract from the Japanese raisin tree reduced symptoms of intoxication in rats.