From the BBC:
About 60,000 people have been left homeless by recent flooding in North Korea, according to the UN food agency.
The floods have also destroyed 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of farmland, causing the loss of 100,000 tonnes of food, the World Food Programme said.
On Friday North Korea’s official media admitted that “hundreds of people” were thought to be dead or missing after last week’s torrential rain.
The North already relies on outside aid to support its impoverished people.
Food aid from neighbouring South Korea is currently suspended after talks between the two sides collapsed last week, in the wake of Pyongyang’s 5 July missile tests.
South Korea has also been hit by the seasonal storms, with around 60 people dead or missing after last week’s rains.
Vulnerable population
The World Food Programme said it would initially help 1,300 people in the worst-hit region of South Pyongan, providing 74 tonnes of food.
According to the agency, the government is still trying to assess the situation, but “overall, the updates indicate rising levels of damage”.
North Korea has relied for more than a decade on foreign donations to feed its people.
The WFP began working in the country in the mid 1990s, after about two million people died from famine.
According to the most recent large-scale survey in October 2004, the WFP found that 37% of young children were chronically malnourished, and one-third of mothers were malnourished and anaemic.
from the BBC:
Hundreds are dead or missing in North Korea after days of heavy rain, according to state media.
Torrential rain has swept through the Korean Peninsula in recent days, causing flooding and landslides both sides of the border.
This is the first confirmation from Pyongyang that the severe weather has led to human casualties.
On Wednesday, state news agency KCNA said flooding had caused “tremendous” economic losses.
The Red Cross said in a statement on the same day that 100 people were dead or missing and entire villages had been swept away.
“This heavy rain left hundreds of people dead or missing in many parts of the country,” KCNA said in its latest statement, although it did not give specific figures.
Tens of thousands of houses have been destroyed and infrastructure such as roads and bridges has been badly hit, the agency said.
The worst damage was in central and eastern parts of the country. In South Pyongan Province, about 6,200 houses and 490 public buildings were damaged and large tracts of agricultural land under water, KCNA said.
Damage to farming land would be a blow for North Korea, which has in the past experienced severe food shortages caused by natural disasters and outdated agricultural methods.
Food aid from neighbouring South Korea is currently suspended after talks between the two sides collapsed last week in the wake of Pyongyang’s 5 July missile tests.
South Korea has also been hit by the seasonal storms, with around 60 people dead or missing after days of rain.
From Reuters 7/20/2006 (via Korea Liberator):
Floods could push North Korea back into famine
Jon Herskovitz
7/20/2006
North Korea, constantly battling food shortages, could be tipped into famine after heavy flooding this month in key farming regions hit its potato and rice crops, experts said on Thursday.
Two major storms over the past 10 days have hit the impoverished country with some of the heaviest rainfalls in years just as it faces greater international isolation over missile tests this month and the prospect of less food aid from its major donor, South Korea.
“Conditions have never been that good in North Korea and this could push them over the edge again,” said Peter Beck, an expert in Korean affairs for the International Crisis Group.
“This has increased the probability of a famine returning to North Korea,” he said.
Up to 2.5 million North Koreans, or about 10 percent of its population, died in the 1990s due to famines caused by droughts, flooding and mismanagement of the agriculture sector, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) said studies have indicated.
Anthony Banbury, director of the WFP’s Regional Bureau for Asia said the floods hurt the potato crop, which is used as a filler until the rice crop comes in.
The floods will also likely hurt rice production and come with the North already short of fertilizer.
“There is a real risk that this combination of factors is going to have a very negative impact on the food security situation in the coming months,” Banbury said by telephone from Bangkok.
He said Pyongyang’s main benefactor China probably shipped North Korea far less food in the first quarter of this year than it did in the same period of last year.
South Korea has sent huge amounts of rice and fertilizer aid to North Korea over the past several years. But it has rejected the North’s latest request for 500,000 tons for rice for this year, unless Pyongyang returns to stalled talks on ending its nuclear weapons programs.
Beck said if North Korea faces a real humanitarian crisis, it would be difficult for South Korea and other countries not to donate food.
Even in a good year, North Korea’s harvest falls about 1 million tons short of its needs, experts have said.
FLOODING IN RICE BASKET
The Red Cross said floods struck North Korea’s South Pyongan province and Hwanghae province. Both surround the capital Pyongyang and are part of the country’s rice basket.
“Extensive areas of arable fields have been inundated, wiping out much of the anticipated harvest,” the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said this week.
South Korean Unification Minister Lee Jong-seok told reporters on Thursday that Seoul is sticking by its decision to suspend food aid for now. He added South Korea will still push for peaceful engagement with its neighbor.
Ties between the two Koreas, which have warmed considerably in recent years, have been severely tested by the missile tests. North Korea stormed out of a cabinet-level meeting last week after Seoul pressed Pyongyang to explain why it defied international warnings by firing seven missiles on July 5.
Severe winters keep North Korea to a single food producing season that runs from June to October.
Even then, it has a difficult time raising food because of outdated and dilapidated farm equipment, energy shortages and a lack of fertilizer and pesticide.
