Archive for August, 2020

The 8th WPK congress announcement: strengthened economic control to come?

Wednesday, August 19th, 2020

By Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

So, the news are out: the central committee of the WPK has formally decided that the Party will hold its 8th Congress in January 2021:

8th Congress of WPK to Be Convened
Pyongyang, August 20 (KCNA) — A decision of the 6th Plenary Meeting of the 7th Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea was made on August 19.
The decision is as follows:
Our Party and people are carrying out the historical task set forth at the Seventh Congress of the Workers’ Party of Korea while breaking through head-on all the barriers to our advance by organizing and launching an arduous revolutionary struggle.

Through this indomitable struggle for implementing the decision made at the Seventh Congress of the WPK the dignity and position of our state has been remarkably raised, the single-minded unity of the Party and the people further consolidated and a great revolutionary turn made in the building of the Party and its overall activities.

On the other hand, economy was not improved in the face of the sustaining severe internal and external situations and unexpected manifold challenges, thereby planned attainment of the goals for improving the national economy have been seriously delayed and the people’s living standard not been improved remarkably.

The plenary meeting, after analyzing and reviewing the experience and lessons from the work of the past five years for building a powerful socialist country, decided to convene the Eighth Congress of the WPK as follows to set forth a correct line of struggle and strategic and tactical policies on the basis of the new requirements of our developing revolution and the prevailing situation:

1. The Eighth Congress of the WPK will be convened in January, Juche 110(2021).
2. The agendas of the Eighth Congress of the WPK are as follows:
1) Review of the work of the Central Committee of the WPK
2) Review of the work of the Central Auditing Commission of the WPK
3) On revising the rules of the WPK
4) Election of the leadership organ of the WPK Central Committee
3. One delegate with the right to vote to the Congress will be appointed among every 1 300 Party members and one delegate with the right to speak among every 1 300 candidate Party members. -0-

Kim Jong-un’s speech, however, was far more interesting than the announcement of these agenda items. In my opinion, there are hints in his speech that the Party will continue down the road of strengthening state and Party control over the economy. That doesn’t necessarily spell a return to central planning, but it does mean more restrictions and stronger demands that enterprises and other economic actors adhere to state “goalposts”; perhaps targets of production, and sectors of priority. More like a developmental state than a Stalinist command economy, at least in theory.

Look, for example, at the following two paragraphs from the summary of his speech (my emphasis):

Calling for regularly convening the congresses of the Party, the supreme guidance organ of the Party, in order to confirm the line, strategic and tactical measures for steering the development of the times and the revolution and adjust and reinforce the leadership body for guaranteeing their execution, he advanced the important guidelines for the operation of the congress.

And:

The Supreme Leader stressed the need for all the sectors and units including the Party organizations at all levels, power organs and organs of the armed forces to regularly in time sum up the results of the work so as not to deviate from the implementation of the Party’s basic lines, policies and decisions. He also said that they should encourage and develop good successes, overcome shortcomings and take rectification measures at the double and thus achieve new progress in advancing the revolution and construction and in strengthening the Party.

This fits well with the simultaneous announcement of another five-year plan for economic development. This also doesn’t mark a return to central planning, necessarily, but rather, the state asserting its right to set forth the main guidelines of economic development. The last one, adopted in 2016, was subsequently abandoned, and we should also not expect this coming strategy to be entirely written in stone.

The agenda item about the central auditing commission is also interesting. In these contexts, auditing often entails the state scrutinizing the books of various organs, looking for off-the-books resources and other ways to bring in more cash to the state.

An agenda item for the central auditing commission is nothing unique in itself, but substantially, it may relate to the current push of the state to take in more resources from wherever they can be found.

Over the past couple of years or so, as its funds have run increasingly low, the state has been pushing private and semi-private economic actors to hand over more of their resources to the government. Strengthening auditing practices may be a way of institutionalizing this push more regarding finances related to the Party.

(Update 20/8/20: I clarified the text somewhat above about the central auditing commission after this came up in a twitter discussion.)

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What economic issues will the WPK politburo discuss?

Wednesday, August 19th, 2020

By Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

The WPK politburo is meeting (or already met?) Wednesday August 19th, today, to discuss economic and military issues of “crucial significance in developing the Korean revolution and increasing the fighting efficiency of the party.”

At the present time of writing, it has not been reported or hinted at what these issues might be. I personally would not be surprised if perhaps another struggle campaign is afoot. “Battles” and the like for harvests and overall economic production are common in North Korea, as they were in other communist countries.

This essentially entails people having to take hours and hours after work to go “volunteer” at fields, construction sites and the like. It’s an easy, blanket solution to economic problems. They of course solve nothing in the long run, but may push a bit of extra production in a situation where the regime has few immediate alternatives.

At this point, speculation is quite useless in any case. Soon we will probably know more about what these issues are.

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North Korea’s summer floods, 2020

Monday, August 17th, 2020

By: Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Flooding has been sweeping across North Korea for the past few weeks. As has been usual for the past few years, state media has been very forthcoming in reporting the damage. At least partially, one might suspect this forthrightness is directed to an international audience, not least in China, to signal that North Korea hopes for aid. (Quietly, of course, behind the scenes, because officially, the country doesn’t want it.)

First and foremost, however, the target audience is – as usual – domestic, and the state seeks to reassure the people that the leadership is always watching out for them. Here’s the Rodong coverage of Kim Jong-un’s trip to a flood-damaged area:

Kim Jong Un, chairman of the Workers’ Party of Korea, chairman of the State Affairs Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and supreme commander of the armed forces of the DPRK, inspected Taechong-ri Area of Unpha County, North Hwanghae Province hit by flood.

Due to several consecutive days of torrential rain and rainstorm recently caused by the seasonal rainy front, the waterway levee gave way in the area of Taechong-ri of Unpha County, leaving more than 730 single-floored houses and 600-odd hectares of rice field inundated and 179 blocks of dwelling houses destroyed.

After hearing the report on the situation of the Taechong-ri area of Unpha County where lots of dwelling houses and a large area of arable land were submerged, the Supreme Leader personally went to the spot to learn about the situation and clarified tasks and ways in detail for the recovery of the damaged area.

Saying that he was really relieved to learn that there was no casualty as all the residents of Unpha County were evacuated to the safe area in advance, he called on leading organs in the county including Party and power organs, working people’s organizations and public security organs to responsibly conduct the work of putting up the residents who lost their homes at offices including those at the Party committee and people’s committee of the county, public buildings and separate houses, to stabilize their living and comfort them.

He ordered the relevant field to submit a document on supplying every household in the afflicted area with the reserve food grain of the chairman of the State Affairs Commission.

It is of priority importance to quickly supply sleeping materials, daily commodities, medicines and other necessities to the flood-affected people to stabilize their living as early as possible, he said, entrusting this task entirely to the departments of the Party Central Committee and families of its officials.

He gave an order to organize the flood damage rehabilitation headquarters with cadres of the relevant departments of the Party Central Committee and the Ministry of the People’s Armed Forces, and instructed the headquarters to report to him after correctly calculating the materials and forces needed for the rehabilitation, while sizing up the flood damage on the spot for starters.

The central designing force should be sent to newly build 800 model houses in the farm village of Unpha County hit by the flood and the project be completed at an earliest date possible and on the highest level, he said.

Saying he decided to mobilize the people’s army for the rehabilitation again, he ordered the people’s army to form a necessary force and urgently deploy it and to give precedence to the arrangement of the wrecked houses, roads and the zones with the people of the county.

Stressing the importance to take measures to ensure materials such as cement necessary for the rehabilitation, he gave an instruction to use the strategic reserve supplies of the chairman of the State Affairs Commission to meet the calculated amount.

He appealed to the Cabinet, the State Planning Commission, ministries and national institutions to actively cooperate in the rehabilitation of the flood-hit Unpha County, well aware of the Party’s intention.

(Source: Political News Team, “Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un Inspects Flood-Damaged Area in North Hwanghae Province,” Rodong Sinmun, August 7th, 2020.) 

Indeed, damage has been quite bad, as Washington Post reports here, but it’s not clear as of yet how it will add up in comparison with previous years:

The International Federation of the Red Cross said the floods have left at least 22 people dead and four missing, citing the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Red Cross and the country’s State Committee for Emergency and Disaster Management.

The disaster adds to a troubling humanitarian situation in North Korea, whose weak economy has been further battered by the coronavirus pandemic.

The official Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) said at least 16,680 houses and 630 public buildings have been destroyed or flooded during the monsoon, with nearly 100,000 acres of crops damaged and many roads, bridges and railway tracks broken. A dam at a power station also gave way, it said.

(Source: Simon Denyer, “North Korea floods kill 22, approach nuclear reactor — but Kim doesn’t want help,” Washington Post, August 14th, 2020.)

Daily NK cites internal documents claiming that over 40 percent of terraced corn fields in North Hamgyong have flooded away. They also report, unsurprisingly, that the county visited by Kim personally is getting a disproportionate amount of attention and help:

Monsoon rains and strong winds have led to substantial damage in the grain-producing regions of North Korea’s west coast, leading to predictions that the country will face a poor harvest this year, Daily NK has learned.

“North Hamgyong Province is the center of the country’s corn production, but an [internal] statistical report on Aug. 3 said that 42% of terraced cornfields and farmland near rivers had been either washed away or flooded,” a source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Monday. “The report did not include data about farms tilled by individual farmers. Including those farms would mean that the actual damage [to farmland] is even greater.”

Regarding the situation in nearby South Hamgyong Province, the source told Daily NK that “South Hamgyong Province is the home of rice [production], but midway through the monsoon season approximately 30% of farmland has already been flooded.”

According to the source, the harvest this year in the region was actually better than last year until the start of the monsoon season. He pointed out, however, that “rice plants became inundated with water just as they were being fertilized, so there is talk that farmers will barely be able to meet the government’s autumn quota for military rice [rice going to the military].”

Farms in the coastal areas of South Pyongan Province have also suffered from flooding and crop damage, a source in the region said.

“There has been substantial damage to crops, with monsoon rains flooding fields in several areas near the central west coast and strong winds blowing over corn plants that were just beginning to mature,” the source said. “Farmland stretching across thousands of jongbo in Jungsan and Pyongwon have been damaged by salt water, which means we can’t expect normal harvest levels this year.”

One jongbo is equivalent to around 9,917 square meters.

Areas near Nampo, including Onchon and Gangso, were hit by monsoon rains and strong gales that felled telephone poles and roadside trees, according to the source, who also reported that dozens of farm houses have collapsed and their now-homeless former occupants have been evacuated to other structures on farms, including cultural halls and rooms used by work units.

RAPID CLEAN UP EFFORTS IN UNPA COUNTY

After North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited North Hamgyong Province’s Unpa County to see the devastation wrought by a dyke that burst open, efforts to cleanup the damage are rapidly underway, a source in the area told Daily NK.

“The Supreme Leader came to inspect [the damage] in Unpa County personally, and the province has dispatched a storm trooper contingent made up of 300 party members along with another storm trooper unit made up of around 500 Kimsungilist-Kimjongilist Youth League members,” the source said.

“The authorities have also mobilized workers from various businesses in the province while [Unpa County] farmers, along with village and district-level inminban [North Korea’s lowest administrative unit], are working to process barren soil, build embankments, restore farmland and repair people’s homes,” he added.

People who have lost their homes in the area have been housed in cultural halls, guest houses, local inns or the houses of friends; however, county authorities have forced many to engage in the cleanup efforts, according to the source.

The military has mobilized soldiers to the area, including 280 soldiers selected from units under the “August 15 Training Center” along with two battalions from the 25th Brigade under Bureau 7 (a military engineers unit). The battalions have reportedly brought along mechanized equipment for the cleanup efforts. The soldiers have set up waterproof tents and are living in the area while cleaning up the damage.

On Aug. 7, Rodong Sinmun and other state-run media reported that Kim Jong Un visited Unpa County and ordered the construction of a new farming village to accommodate 800 families, as well as the release of grain reserves and emergency supplies for victims and those performing relief work.

The source confirmed that the authorities had ordered the completion of housing blocks accommodating two families each by Nov. 10.

“Military units along with the storm trooper units made up of provincial party members and members of the Youth League will build the houses,” the source said. “Overall responsibility for the project is held by both the Cabinet’s vice premier and the North Hwanghae Province Party Committee Director, and progress reports will be sent to the Supreme Leader.”

AN UNPA COUNTY-FOCUSED RELIEF EFFORT

North Korea is also holding a nationwide campaign to raise funds for the relief work and the construction of new houses in Unpa County, according to the source.

“Even though the damage [by the monsoon rains] is not limited to Unpa County, inminban around the country have been told that they must offer assistance to the area by sending support packages for affected residents and soldiers engaged in construction work by Aug. 13,” the source told Daily NK.

While the required contribution differs by region, the figure is believed to be KPW 20,000 for each household in Pyongyang’s Mangyongdae District and KPW 10,000 or 2.5 kilograms of rice for each family in Kaechon, South Pyongan Province. Families in Sariwon, North Hwanghae Province, have been told to either contribute KPW 15,000 per household or provide labor in lieu of a monetary payment.

On Monday, Korea Central News Agency and other state-run media reported that vehicles carrying the reserve grain sent by Kim Jong Un had arrived in Unpa County. The article was accompanied by photos of residents welcoming the delivery.

“This [kind of delivery] happened once before during the General [Kim Jong Il]’s reign, but people were deeply moved because it is the first time they have been provided with such a gift under Kim Jong Un,” the source said, adding, “Those in other regions are envious.”

(Source: Ha Yoon Ah, “N. Korea moves to cleanup monsoon damage across grain-producing regions,” Daily NK, August 12th, 2020.)

Resources for relief efforts are scarce. As Radio Free Asia reports here (in Korean), enterprises as well as private citizens are being ordered to contribute.

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