The title of this blog poast comes from a recent study by the North Korea Resource Institute (NKRI). As far as I can tell they do not have a web page (in English anyhow), so I have been unable to obtain the actual report. The results, however, were reported in Yonhap:
The potential value of North Korea’s underground mineral resources is estimated at more than 11 quadrillion won (US$9.7 trillion) as of this year, a report by a private think tank showed Sunday.
The findings are based on the potential value and commercial prices of 18 key minerals in the communist country, the Seoul-based North Korea Resource Institute (NKRI) said.
The figure is much higher than a 7 quadrillion won estimate released by state-run Korea Resources Corp. in 2010, which calculated the value of resources based on 2008 market prices.
“The 4 quadrillion won gap is mainly due to a sharp rise in global prices for raw materials,” Choi Kyung-soo, head of the institute said.
Based on the latest estimates, he said, the value of North Korea’s mineral resources is roughly 21 times larger than those of South Korea, which stand at $456.3 billion for this year.
Choi said the North Korea’s abundance can be attributed to its large reserves of iron ore, coal, limestone and magnesite.
Choi Kyung-soo wote this paper for the Nautilus Institute. Here is my response (or companion piece, rather) to it.
Here are previous posts on mining.
Read the full Yonhap story here:
N. Korea’s mineral resources potentially worth $9.7 tln: report
Yonhap
2012-8-26
