Food security and aid
According to the APF:
North Korea is heading for a “chronic” new food crisis with drought and floods in different parts of the country exacerbated by cuts in international aid, the United Nations said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern “that the acute humanitarian needs” of at least 3.5 million women and children in North Korea would worsen because of food shortages.
Even though North Korea is considered by many to be the world’s most isolated state, Ban said in a report to be discussed Friday that “the global economic crisis is further increasing the levels of hardship” adding to the “chronic food insecurity”.
South Korea on Friday said it had no immediate plan to resume large-scale food aid to North Korea despite the UN warning on the food crisis.
“The government stance is that in order for the massive government food aid to be resumed, overall inter-Korean relations must be taken into account,” Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-Joo told AFP.
She stressed, however, that Seoul allows smaller-scale “humanitarian aid” to the North, including 5,000 tonnes of rice and other aid supplies currently being shipped victims of floods that devastated northwestern North Korea in August.
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There has been a shortage of rainfall in some parts of the country but in August torrential downpours caused floods in the north, near the Chinese border.
The UN predicted that the cereal yield would be nearly a fifth lower than in 2009.
It said the country needs 3.5 million tons of cereals a year to feed its population and would have to import 1.1 million tons. In addition, UN agencies had raised only 20 percent of the 492 million dollars they estimated in 2009 would be needed for the North.
Ban quoted the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) as saying that each year, some 40,000 children under five become “acutely malnourished” in North Korea, with 25,000 needing hospital treatment.
“The lack of maintenance of water and sanitation systems increases rates of diarrhoea and acute respiratory infections, which are leading causes of child death.
“In addition, one third of women of childbearing age suffer from anaemia, a nutrition deficiency that is also a major cause of maternal mortality.”
The poor diet across the country leads to widespread “infectious diseases, physical and mental development disorders, poor labour productivity and an increased risk of premature death,” said the grim report.
A survey carried out by the government with UN support showed that about one third of the population suffer from stunting — below normal body growth. In some regions the figure was 45 percent.
The report was intended to be on human rights in North Korea and the UN chief said there was an “urgent need” for Kim Jong-Il’s regime to take steps to provide the basic right to food, water, sanitation and health.
The UN reported little change in the “comprehensive restrictions” on freedom of speech, religion and opinion in the tightly policed state. “The government’s control over the flow of information is strict and pervasive.”
Ban highlighted the difficulty in getting reliable information on events in the North.
But he said: “There are a number of reports concerning public executions, the use of torture, forced labour and the ill-treatment of refugees or asylum-seekers repatriated from abroad.”
His report said North Korea’s UN delegation had acknowledged that public executions were carried out for “very brutal violent crimes.”
It added that the UN envoy on rights in North Korea had raised concerns with the North’s mission about conditions in six prisons and detention centers reportedly used for political prisoners.
With the North embroiled in a dispute with South Korea over the sinking of a warship and in a nuclear arms standoff with the international community, Ban said humanitarian aid should not be restricted “on the basis of political and security concerns.”
Though unrelated to the UN findings, South Korea is shipping 5,000 tons of rice to the DPRK today. According to Yonhap:
The Red Cross aid, which is aimed at helping the North cope with the aftermath of floods, marks South Korea’s first government-funded provision of rice to the North since President Lee Myung-bak took office in early 2008 on a pledge to link aid to progress in efforts to end Pyongyang’s nuclear programs.
Seoul also plans to send a shipment of 10,000 tons of cement to the North later this week.
A total of 13.9 billion won (US$12.3 million) came from the government coffers to finance the flood aid.
Also Monday, three Red Cross officials prepared to fly to the Chinese city to receive the rice and instant noodles there and transport the relief supplies by truck to the flood-hit North Korean border city of Sinuiju, according to officials from the Red Cross and the Unification Ministry.
The cargo ships are expected to arrive in Dandong around Wednesday.
Rice will be delivered in five-kilogram packages, and each package is marked with “Donation from the Republic of Korea,” South Korea’s official name.
In August, South Korea first offered to provide relief aid to the North after devastating floods hit the communist nation. North Korea later asked for rice, heavy construction equipment and materials.
Stories about South Korean aid in 2010 can be found here.
China has also pledged food assistance. According to KBS:
A Japanese daily says China pledged 500-thousand tons of rice aid to North Korea during Kim Jong-il’s visit to China in August.
The New York Times raises the concern that food aid may be diverted. According to the article:
Rice, a staple of the diets in both Koreas, is also a highly symbolic item in terms of food aid throughout Asia. The 5,000 tons of rice in the shipment on Monday can feed about 325,000 people for a month, according to Red Cross estimates.
Some analysts and aid workers expressed concern that the rice would likely be diverted to political elites, loyal party members and the military rather than delivered to the neediest in the North. That has been the pattern, they said, of previous government aid deliveries.
“I’m not unhappy about food going up, but I fear that this kind of government-to-government distribution to Pyongyang will be carried out along loyalty lines,” said Tim Peters, founder of the civic group Helping Hands Korea. “Distribution through small NGOs that are more strategically placed and can get the food into the interior and places like remote mining towns, that is the more intelligent strategy.”
Mr. Peters said his group, which primarily assists North Korean refugees, has received numerous reports from defectors from what he called “the Siberia of North Korea” that residents in the hinterlands “never see any of this kind of food aid.”
Five weeks ago, a truck convoy delivered 203 tons of rice to North Korea, the first rice donations of any kind from the South in nearly three years. That nongovernmental assistance, which was donated by charity groups and opposition political parties, came one day after a shipment of 530 tons of flour was sent by a South Korean provincial government and civic groups.
