North Korean Economy Watch

World Environment Day Observed
KCNA
6/5/2007

Papers here Tuesday dedicate articles to the World Environment Day.

Rodong Sinmun says in a signed article that diverse activities and functions are now under way in the DPRK according to the theme for this year designated by the United Nations Environment Programme.

It goes on:

The DPRK has long paid great attention to the environmental protection helpful to promoting the people’s health, increasing the scenic beauty of cities and providing better living conditions and environment. Thanks to the correct environmental protection policy of the DPRK government, the DPRK is recognized by the world community as a country with good environment.

The issue of environmental protection is now presenting itself as a very important and urgent one worldwide. Ecological environment is being seriously contaminated in various parts of the world for various reasons.

No country can be an exception in the work to protect the environment on the earth. Good results can be expected in this work only when all countries make positive efforts, aware of the urgency and importance of the work.

The DPRK will conduct positive work for environmental protection, maintaining close touch with international organizations in the future, too.

Minju Joson in a signed article notes that global warming is the most serious worldwide problem at present, adding that the melting of ice in the polar areas is the most vivid example of it. In order to cope with the situation the DPRK is taking steps to increase and firmly protect fresh water resources, stop soil from being washed away and prevent damage by strong winds and floods.
DPRK Strives to Prevent Global Warming
KCNA
6/5/2007

The abnormal climate phenomena caused by global warming has been raised today as a hard problem in the world.

The UN Environment Programme set “Global Warming” as the theme for this year on the occasion of the World Environment Day (June 5), since it threatens the life and security of humankind.

Organized on the occasion of the day in the country were colorful events including a scientific symposium and a national seminar on reducing the emission of atmospheric green-house gases and preventing global warming, and film shows for arousing profound social interest in the issue.

Jong Hyong Il, a department director in the Ministry of Land and Environment Preservation, told KCNA that the DPRK which has been suffering from the upward temperature in recent years is conducting varied activities in accordance with the world trend for preventing such phenomena. He went on:

It deepens the scientific researches into elevation of energy efficiency and utilization of regenerated energy and directs efforts to the work for applying the results.

The construction of large and minor hydro-power stations is being pushed ahead through an all-people movement and application of wind power positively encouraged.

An effort to improve the efficiency of solar batteries is being made, too.

Meanwhile, a brisk tree-planting campaign is being launched to increase the adsorption of carbon.

The DPRK, a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol and the Montreal Protocol on Substances Destroying Ozone Layer, is doing its best to restrict and reduce the emission of atmospheric green-house gases as much as possible.

World Environment Day Marked
KCNA
6/5/2007

An event took place at Changdok School on June 5 to observe World Environment Day.

Present there were officials in the field of environmental protection and teachers, employees and students of the school.

Also present on invitation were the associate director of the “Environmental Education Media Project” whose office is located in China and environment experts of different countries.

The guests laid bouquets before the statue of President Kim Il Sung at the school and paid a tribute to him.

After going round the historic building where the President studied, they were briefed on the history of the school.

The function heard speeches on the importance of the environment protection.

The participants watched a recorded material on global warming and pictures on the theme of it before appreciating a performance given by an art group of the school.

The guests appreciated the schoolchildren’s activities of the care-for-the-homeland team.

KCNA
5/22/2007

May 22 is the International Day of Biodiversity.

The global ecosystem has been seriously destroyed, rapidly decreasing the bio-resources needed for the life of the people. The actuality has risen as an urgent problem to protect the biodiversity in recent years.

According to the data released by the World Conservation Union, biological species which have been extinguished total over 1,000 and those on the brink of extermination far exceed 10,000.

The DPRK is abundant in biodiversity compared with the size of its territory. Under the correct nature preservation policy of the government, the work for protecting ecological diversity have been undertaken as an affair of the state and all people from long ago.

Lots of nature reserves including the Mt. Oga nature reserve, natural parks including Mt. Myohyang and Mt. Kumgang, reserves for native animals, plants and birds and their habitation, reserves for natural products and reserves for natural resources have been set to protect ecological diversity.

The Paektusan biosphere reserve has been preserved and managed amid the special concern of the Korean people from long ago. It was registered as an international biosphere reserve in April Juche 78 (1989).

The biological resources have been protected and increased by various methods including recovery of ecosystem and enhancement of biological function outside the reserves.

The production units such as forestry, agriculture and fishing industry are protecting the biodiversity through development and application of new science and technologies and, at the same time, are taking measures to ensure their sustainable utilization.

The relevant units including the Ministry of Land and Environment Conservation and the DPRK Natural Conservation Union have worked out strategies and action programs for biodiversity and are directing primary efforts to protecting and propagating indigenous species, those in a crisis and rare ones.

The state is pushing ahead with the protection of biodiversity through the institution of laws and regulations and the establishment of administrative and technical management systems. And it does not stint investment to the development of management technologies for analyzing, removing or minimizing the threat to the biodiversity.

And the state is turning the protection of biodiversity into the work of popular masses through the education and propaganda.

It is also taking positive measures for strengthening the international exchange and cooperation as an important part of the international efforts to ease the ecological crisis.

KCNA
5/22/2007

The Paektusan biosphere reserve in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea covers a vast area from Mt. Paektu to the southeast direction.

Mt. Paektu, starting point of the Great Paektu Range, is a celebrated mountain with precious wealth in the scenic and ecological, historical and cultural aspects.

Mt. Paektu, volcanic creature, 2,750 meters above the sea level, the vast land around it and Lake Chon, a large crater lake, which is the fountainhead of rivers and streams, go well with each other, presenting a beautiful landscape.

Mt. Paektu covered with a thick pumice stone layer, which looks like a mountain capped with snow all the year round, the clean and blue water of the Lake Chon, the boundless forests covering the vast land, the Lake Samji among the forests, water-falls with their fountainhead in the Lake Chon, wild flowers on the highland and the unique ecosystem on the boundary line of the forests–all these constitute a natural landscape that can be seen only in the Paektusan biosphere reserve.

Animals such as Korean tiger, deer and musk deer, trees of various species including larch, Abies nephrolipis and birch, wild vegetables, medicinal herbs, aromatic and flower plants form a forest ecological system in the reserve.

Chonji char accustomed to the Lake Chon attracts special attention of experts.

Mt. Paektu and its surrounding area, which are of great significance in preservation of biodiversity, were registered as an international biosphere reserve in April Juche 78 (1989).

The DPRK government set the area as a natural reserve in 1959 and as a special reserve of revolutionary battle sites in 1985.

KCNA
3/22/2007

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has directed much effort to the work for protecting the water environment. The protection of water environment is very important in solving the water issue, which is raised as a serious socio-economic one in the world today. 

In recent years, the DPRK has instituted the Law on Preventing the Pollution of the River Taedong (provisional), Law on Barrages, Law on Appraising Environmental Influence and Law on Land Program to intensify the legal control over water environment and augmented the state investment in the field. 

It is concretizing and constantly renewing the already instituted water environmental standards and is pushing ahead with the work for introducing the authentication system in the protection and management of water environment. 

Besides, it deepens the research for the prevention of pollution along with the work for grasping the pollution resources and restricting the permissible discharge of contaminated materials in order to improve the water quality of rivers and streams. 

A river is divided into three parts, upper, middle and lower, where water quality observation posts have been set up to examine water quality. Meanwhile, the contaminated water of the lower-stream is displaced with the fresh water of the upper-stream in spring. 

A work for preventing the pollution by the rapidly increased water plant is consolidated in the lower part of the rivers where lock gates were built. 

In order to improve the quality of the contaminated water of the border rivers, activities for joint observation and for taking prevention measures are being conducted with the neighboring countries. 

Along with this, the country also deepens the research into the prevention of oil outflow, the main contamination material in the sea, and the disposal of ballast water of foreign-flagged ships and regularly conducts the examination of underground water quality. 

The country is further intensifying the supervision over water environment for consolidating the success already made in the efforts for improving the water quality.

BBC
Alex Kirby
8/27/2004

[NKeconWatch: Here is the report-  DPRK_SOE_Report.pdf]

The UN and officials in Pyongyang have agreed the first-ever assessment of the state of the North Korean environment.

The report was written by North Korea’s national co-ordinating council for the environment, together with the UN’s Development and Environment Programmes.

The head of Unep said Pyongyang had shown its readiness to work with the world community to safeguard nature.

The report lists a catalogue of neglect and over-exploitation of resources, and says time is short to put things right.

The report, DPR Korea: State Of The Environment 2003, was produced by officials from 20 government and academic agencies, with training and guidance from the two UN programmes.

Future collaboration

It was compiled as a result of a visit to Pyongyang in 2000 by Unep’s executive director, Dr Klaus Toepfer.

He and Dr Ri Jung Sik, secretary-general of the national co-ordinating council, have now signed a framework agreement on joint activities to improve environmental protection.

The report covers five areas: forests, water, air, land and biodiversity. It says the most urgent priority is the degradation of forest resources.

Forests cover 74% of North Korea, but almost all are on steep slopes. In the last decade the forests have declined in extent and quality.

The report says this is because of timber production, a doubling of firewood consumption, wild fires, insect attacks associated with drought, and conversion of forest to farmland.

On water it says demand is rising “with economic development and the improvement in standards of living”, and calls for urgent investment in domestic sewage and industrial water treatment.

It notes that large quantities of untreated wastewater and sewage are discharged into rivers, and says some diseases related to water use “are surging”.

Air quality, the report says, “is deteriorating, especially in urban and industrial areas”. Energy consumption is expected to double over 30 years, from almost 48m tonnes of oil equivalent in 1990 to 96 million tonnes in 2020.

North Korea’s use of coal is projected to increase five times from 2005 to 2020, underlining, the report says, “the urgent need for clean coal combustion and exhaust gas purification technologies, energy efficiency, and renewable energy alternatives.”

On land use, the report says self-sufficiency in food production has been a national policy aim in North Korea.

Changed priorities

But it continues: “Major crop yields fell by almost two thirds during the 1990s due to land degradation caused by loss of forest, droughts, floods and tidal waves, acidification due to over-use of chemicals, as well as shortages of fertiliser, farm machinery and oil.

“Vulnerable soils require an expansion of restorative policies and practices such as flood protection works, tree planting, terracing and use of organic fertilisers.
“Recognising such issues, [the country] adjusted its legal and administrative framework, designating environmental protection as a priority over all productive practices and identifying it as a prerequisite for sustainable development.”

North Korea is home to several critically endangered species, among them the Amur leopard, the Asiatic black bear and the Siberian tiger.

Squaring the circle

It has signed up to international environmental agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity, though the report notes a continuing “contradiction between protection and development”, which it says is being overcome.

In a wider context, the report says: “The conflict between socio-economic progress and a path of truly sustainable development is likely to be further aggravated unless emerging issues can be settled in time.”

It says environmental laws and regulations need to be formulated or upgraded, management mechanisms improved, financial investment encouraged, and research focused on priorities.

Dr Toepfer said North Korea “has shown its willingness to engage with the global community to safeguard its environmental resources, and we must respond so it can meet development goals in a sustainable manner.”