North Korean Economy Watch

According to Newsweek:

North Korea’s foremost trade debt to the western world is bizarre even by North Korean standards. Each time the administration misses a payment, as it has done every year for the past 40 years, we are reminded of one of the most unexpected political twists of the last century: Kim Il-sung scamming Sweden out of 1,000 Volvo 144 sedans.
…
Each fiscal year, the Swedish Export Credits Guarantee Board calculates interest on a single debt that accounts for more than half of all its political claims. It’s been a tradition since 1974, when the government agency was advised to insure Volvo, Atlas Copco, Kockum, and other Swedish companies’ exports to an entirely new buyer: Supreme Leader Kim Il-sung. For nearly half a century, the Board has been in charge of the Sisyphean task of coaxing €300m from a nation that thinks international law is an elaborate gambit designed by capitalist pig-dogs.

“We semi-annually advise when payments fall due,” Stefan Karlsson, the board’s head of risk advisory, tells Newsweek. “However, as is well known, North Korea does not fulfil their part of the agreement.” Sweden being Sweden and North Korea being North Korea, that’s about as hardball as it gets.
…
Small wonder that a regime so impressed with itself soon developed expensive taste. “Inside the 144 GL you sit on leather,” reads the unambiguous 1970s marketing material that Volvo likely sent its North Korean buyers. Together with contemporary industry giants Atlas Copco and Kockums, Volvo was one of the first European companies to foray into the North Korean market, and promptly received an order for 1,000 vehicles, the first of which were delivered in 1974. But less than a year later, the venture blew up at a Swedish-Korean industrial trade fair in Pyongyang, where it suddenly became clear that the Kim regime wasn’t actually paying for the goods it was importing – not even the machines it ordered for the expo. The bills were simply piling up.

Exporters realised that the venture had gone horribly wrong. But for the past few years, Sweden had had North Korea fever, with countless hours and funds spent on diplomatic and industrial ties. Acquiescing in a massive failure was not easy. “Many had been blinded by North Korea’s impressive economic growth – people had raced to get there first,” Lamm Nordenskiöld says. “Sweden was supposed to be the first country to unlock this new market.”

While many companies pressed on with payment negotiations in an effort to save face, Swedish media was having a blast unraveling one of the most bizarre trade debacles in recent memory. In an indignant spread featuring a photo of the supreme leader with the caption “Kim Il-sung – Broke Communist,” Åge Ramsby of the newspaper Expressen in 1976 went all out listing reports of other debts the Kim regime shirked, including a cool €5m to Swiss Rolex, from whom it had allegedly ordered 2,000 wristwatches with the engraving “donated by Kim Il-sung”.

“North Korea had expected to pay their foreign debts with deliveries of copper and zinc,” the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter wrote in 1976, referring to the reserves the imported mining equipment was supposed to unlock. “But the North Korean economists had been too optimistic in their calculations, and the international market price for these ores had also dropped ­catastrophically.”

Fair enough – but two things suggest that botched calculations and sheer lack of funds only partially explain North Korea’s failure to pay up. First, it is widely accepted among biographers and manufacturers that the Kim regime conducted extensive industrial espionage during the trade fair. Colluding to cop specs from technology you’re paying for would be weird even by Kim’s standards.

More importantly, Erik Cornell, a diplomat and former Swedish ambassador to North Korea, recalls in his book North Korea: Emissary to Paradise a widespread local belief that the Western world had finally “seen the light” in the global struggle against the American imperialist – that Europe had recognised its duty to assist the brave People’s Republic, and that quibbles regarding who owed whom money would soon dissolve in grand efforts to crush capitalism as a whole.

Adjusted for interest and inflation, the debt to the Swedish state now exceeds three billion Swedish kronor, or €300m. It is an astronomical claim, particularly on capital that has depreciated to a fraction of its original value.

If Kim Jong-un and his officers rounded up all 1,000 vehicles and sold each of them at the current book value of about €2,000, they would raise 0.6% of the debt.

Read the full story here:
North Korea Owes Sweden €300m for 1,000 Volvos It Stole 40 Years Ago – And Is Still Using
Newsweek
John Ericson
2014-8-29

Pictured above: The Mannyon Pharmaceutical Factory in North Korea which produced the banned medicine.

According to Vietnamnet Bridge:

The Bureau of Food Safety of the Ministry of Health on Wednesday decided to take Angunguhwanghwan (안궁우황환), a functional food produced by North Korea, off the market. It will also destroy all of the products, which contained high concentrations of mercury, arsenic and lead.

Test results of this product revealed that it contained mercury and arsenic exceeding the allowed limits. The Central Institute of Drug Testing collected the samples from the LC Tacy Red Ginseng Showroom in Hanoi.

The bureau has asked the firm to stop circulation, revoke and destroy the Angunguhwanghwan product and report the results to the department before August 29.

The product, produced by the Korea General Mannyon Health Corporation Chongryu No2, North Korea, was imported by Mannyon Vietnam. The product was licensed by the Bureau of Food Safety in July 2013.

As reported by the importer, it imported 30 boxes of this product in June 2014, with the purpose of introducing it to the local market. Four of the boxes were tested.

Here is a photo of the product:

Read the full story here:
N. Korean functional-food item taken off market
Vietnamnet Bridge
Le Ha
2014-8-29

According to the Art Newspaper:

The North Korean government has approved plans by two Norwegian artists to open an art academy in the country. Henrik Placht and Morten Traavik travelled to North Korea together for the first time in August to flesh out the proposal and to look for potential sponsors. So far they have received financial support from the Prince Claus Fund.

The academy is due to be called DMZ after the term for the Korean demilitarised zone. It will primarily be an academy for North Korean students, but the plan is to open it up for international exchange programmes, Placht says.

“One of the reasons for us going to North Korea is that we don’t believe in sanctions and the boycott of art,” Placht tells The Art Newspaper. “Next year we are planning an exhibition and workshop in North Korea, in co-operation with the North Korean government, which will feature well-known international artists as well as North Korean artists,” he adds.

The artists already have good contacts in North Korea thanks to Traavik, who has produced several art projects in the country—some in response to North Korea’s dictatorship. In 2012, Traavik organised The Promised Land, a performance in Kirkenes, northern Norway, in which North Koreans holding flags instructed more than 200 Norwegian soldiers to create sequences of images using individual placards.

That same year, Traavik also produced the first Norwegian arts festival in North Korea, “Yes, we love this country”, named after Norway’s national anthem. Meanwhile, earlier this year, he arranged for musicians from the Kum Song Music School to come to Bergen in western Norway to perform a Norwegian children’s play.

Placht also has experience setting up academies in extreme political contexts. In 2002, he founded the International Academy of Art Palestine, where he was a project director until 2009. “I will be able to draw on my experiences in Palestine when it comes to fundraising, curating and co-operating with the government,” Placht says. “But I will also seek to create trust with North Korea so that they will have a natural ownership of the academy.”

More information here.

Read the full story here:
Norwegian artists plan to open art academy in North Korea
Art Newspaper
Hanne Cecilie Gulstad
2014-8-28

According to Yonhap:

The German government has provided North Korea with US$600,000 in medical aid via [Caritas International], a U.S. media reported Tuesday.

The Roman Catholic group Caritas International, which was launched in Germany in 1897, has been campaigning to help the needy in the impoverished communist nation, especially those infected with tuberculosis (TB) and hepatitis.

“The German government is providing 450,000 euros [$600,000] to be used for the TB patients in the DPRK,” Reinhard A. Wurkner, a Caritas official in charge of Asia, was quoted as telling the Voice of America. DPRK is the acronym for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s official name.

Caritas began its North Korea project in 1996. It has since offered medical and nutritional assistance to TB and hepatitis patients in the country.

Read the full story here:
German gov’t offers US$600,000 in N. Korea aid
Yonhap
2014-8-26

According to Yonhap:

North Korea bought US$7.02 million worth of rice from the neighboring country last month, up 115 percent from $3.27 million a year earlier, according to Chinese trade data from the Seoul-based Korea International Trade Association.

The amount also represents an on-month increase of 53 percent from $4.57 million.

The sudden increase in imports comes amid reports that the price of rice has risen sharply in the North.

According to the South Korean online newspaper DailyNK on Aug. 12, rice cost 5,800 won per kilogram in Pyongyang, up 1,550 won from the middle of July.

Read the full story here:
N. Korea’s imports of Chinese rice more than double
Yonhap
2014-8-25

According to the Daily NK:

The number of North Korean residents permitted to visit relatives in China is down significantly from last year’s statistics during the same period. Yet another attempt to regain control, this move is another attempt by the paranoid leadership to block exchanges with the outside world and the plethora of information available there.

A source in China reported to Daily NK on August 22, “In August, there are usually no large events taking place in North Korea, so it’s usually easier for people to visit family members in China then; this year though, that doesn’t seem to be happening.” He went on to explain the reasoning behind the decline, “There is testimony that the North Korean authorities are actively curtailing the number of those going to China for this purpose.”

North Korean residents traversing the border to visit family members in China began in 2000, just after the period of the famine, referred to as the “Arduous March.” As the authorities could no longer provide regular food rations to the people, it resorted to dispatching them to “go abroad and seek help.” Naturally, China presented as the simplest option.

The currency reform on November 30, 2009 sought to curb inflation and monetary overhang but resulted in the inverse, hyperinflation. Residents took to seeking out their brethren in China for assistance to cope with the additional financial hardship. The outcome of the 100:1 redenomination fostered increased mistrust in the authorities by residents as well as mass panic on the ground; most watched helplessly as hard-earned savings were reduced to worthless bits of paper.

The situation this year is vastly different, the source explained. This month has seen daily averages of five North Korean travelers pass through Dandong Customs House, a sharp decline from the 50-100 individuals who moved through on a given day in past years, an indication that the North Korean authorities have drastically reduced visas permitting these visitations.

A similar dip in numbers arose shortly after events commemorating the anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth on April 15th, 2014; the daily average of North Koreans advancing through Dandong Customs House was approximately 10 people. This is the busiest time of year in North Korea, as rice-planting season runs from May to June and the entire population is mobilized to work on farms, explaining the decline in those headed to China.

“There are some North Koreans who are still going to China, but most of them are involved in business or trading; general residents are nowhere to be seen. Compared to the annual crowds pouring out after ‘Victory Day,’ [July 27th celebrations marking the signing of the Korean War Armistice signed in 1953, perceived as a victory in the North] this is quite unusual,” he said.

The source interpreted this not as an anomaly, but rather as a measure instigated by a regime gaining confidence in its economic status. This year did see record breaking trade activity between China and North Korea and the relative stabilization of market prices in the North. Rather than seeking help abroad, the North Korean authorities are trying to solve these matters domestically; with concurrent attempts to cultivate a better image internationally.

Most notably, residents’ exposure to outside information in China has given the authorities new pause in their willingness to send them abroad; potential economic gains in China are not worth North Koreans breaking away from state ideology.

“In the past, people only had to offer up the proper amount in bribes to the State Security Department to get them to overlook activities by Christians or others entrenched in ideas acquired on the outside, but now it’s certain they would get caught,” he explained. Now that the authorities are aware of the effects, they are ratcheting up their efforts to stem them, “There are so many who don’t return these days that the authorities fear even bigger problems will arise if they allow people to go [to China].”

“The stringent controls placed on border security and outside phone calls are so much more severe since Kim Jong Eun came to power. The latest in this series of attempts at mind control is to do away with any chance for North Koreans to meet freely with relatives in China,” he concluded.

The upcoming September 9th holiday, which marks the founding date of the state, and the day the Chosun Workers’ Party was founded, October 10th, are both expected to yield even fewer able to enter China to visit family members. While there is always the possibility for the North Korean authorities to expand permission again after the events end, the downward trend is expected to continue.

Read the full story here:
NK Authorities Slash China Visits
Daily NK
Lee Sang Yong
2014-08-25

According to Yonhap:

North Korea sent a delegation to a Russian arms exposition last week, a news report said Tuesday, in an apparent sign of Pyongyang’s continuing interest in trading arms despite U.N. sanctions.

North Korean government officials attended this year’s Oboronexpo held in Zhukovsky, near Moscow, from Aug. 13-17, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported, quoting the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS.

The annual arms show puts missile systems, tanks, artillery, and other advanced weapons and relevant technologies on display.

More than 300 defense firms from 11 nations took part in the event.

The RFA, a Washington-based network, said it is possible that the North’s participation was aimed at purchasing weapons.

It has not confirmed whether Pyongyang signed any contracts during the expo, however.

The isolated nation is prohibited from weapons trading under U.N. sanctions imposed in response to long-range rocket and nuclear tests.

Read the full story here:
N. Korea joins Russian arms expo despite sanctions
Yonhap
2014-8-19

According to the Daily NK:

The Ministry of Unification released its plans for the 2014 Inter-Korean Development Program on August 18th. 96 new enterprises are among the proposals stipulated in the report’s 30 articles.

The chief components of the plan include:

1. the establishment of a channel for consistent Inter-Korean dialogue
2. a solution for the Separated Families issue
3. provision of humanitarian aid geared towards North Korean citizens
4. adherence to international regulations through a cooperative exchange system
5. the restoration of national solidarity through sociocultural exchanges
6. expanding other ongoing inter-Korean economic collaboration projects
7. normalization of Kaesong Industrial Park operations and
8. tailoring refugee resettlement funds to individual defector needs.

In a statement about the plan, a Ministry of Unification official said, “There is much significance in the fact that this proposal was a government-wide effort; a total of 24 administrative bodies came together to formulate these ideas and strategies.”

The comprehensive program also included detailed plans for the repair and renovation of the Kaesong-Pyongyang Expressway and the Kaesong-Sinuiju Railway. The premise of the official Inter-Korean Development Program has always been to improve overall conditions in the North while fostering better relations between North and South, but this most recent plan is the first to delineate detailed plans for large-scale investments in infrastructure.

Expansion of other inter-Korean economic collaborations were also outlined, such as:
1. Kaesong-Sinuiju railroad and Kaesong-Pyongyang railroad repairs
2. Imjin River flood prevention business
3. Food and Agriculture Organization [FAO] support of the North Korean fishing industry
4. proposals such as vitalization of inter-Korean shipping are included. In addition, depending on the situation, 5. they plan to gradually introduce reopening trade and commerce, resumption of basic economic cooperation and, launching of new businesses.

A continued dedication to improving human rights in North Korea was also announced, starting with continued pressure on lawmakers to overcome the impasse and pass the North Korean Human Rights Act. The proposed law first appeared in 2005 but has since stagnated in the National Assembly due to failure by ruling and opposition parties to reach a consensus. Additional plans to increase support to private organizations advocating human rights in North Korea as well as striving to implement the recent recommendations by the UN based on the Commission of Inquiry [COI] findings on human rights in North Korea.

The South Korean government expressed its intentions to improve the quality of life for North Korean residents by increasing humanitarian aid and support. Most notably, the South vowed to separate political and humanitarian issues, ensuring that vulnerable social groups receive the support they need, regardless of tensions on the Korean peninsula.

Read the full story here:
Report: 2014 Inter-Korean Development Plans
Daily NK
Koo Jun Hoe
2014-8-19

According to Voice of America:

The U.S. Department of State, in its monthly Refugee Admissions Report, says a total of eight North Koreans have now sought asylum in the U.S. in 2014.

Cheol Park, president of the Association of the Free North Korean American, said in a telephone interview with the VOA Korean service that the refugees came to America via Thailand. “We received information through various activities [that we do],” explained Park.

The association is an organization consisting of North Korean refugees who have settled in the U.S..

North Korean defectors can attain refugee status in the U.S. based on the 2004 North Korean Human Rights Act. However, they are not eligible if they have already settled in South Korea, which gives automatic citizenship to North Koreans and is the preferred destination by the vast majority of those fleeing the communist country.

Park said the refugees in the U.S. receive about $200 in cash, health insurance and food stamps from their respective state government for several months. They are also provided with English education and job offers.

After about a year of living in the U.S., the defectors will be granted permanent residency and are eligible to apply for citizenship five years into their life in America.

The first group of North Koreans, nine in total, entered the United States back in 2006. Since then, 171 North Koreans have entered the U.S. as refugees.

Read the full story here:
Four More North Korean Defectors Arrived in US in July
Voice of America
Yeon Cheol Lee
2014-8-6

According to Xinhua:

The Chinese border city of Yanji in northeastern Jilin Province has opened a direct bus tour service to the neighboring Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), tourism authorities said Monday.

A total of 48 Chinese tourists and two Chinese guides ended their two-day tour to the city of Rason on Sunday completing the first batch of bus tours in Yanji, said Wang Yanbo, deputy chief of Yanji tourism bureau.

The group visited Rajin Port, greenhouses housing Kimilsungia and Kimjongilia, both flower species named after the late DPRK leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, the Korean Ethnic Cultural Park and the beachside of Pipa Island, said Lian Qinghua, general manager of Yanbian Northeast Asia Passenger Transport Group Co,. Ltd travel agency, operator of the tour.

The journey to the DPRK takes around four hours and will operate from Tuesday to Saturday, Lian said.P Compared with other travel methods to Rason, the nonstop trip avoids transfer processing at the China-DPRK border, he said.

Travel figures show about 10,000 Chinese tourists visit the DPRK annually.

Yonhap report here.

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Chinese border city opens bus tour to DPRK
Xinhua
2014-8-4