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UN WFP / UNICEF launch DPRK program

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

UPDATE 1 (2011-5-3): The Korea Herald offers some more information on the mission:

The World Food Program will increase its personnel residing in North Korea to tighten monitoring of the distribution of donated food, a U.S.-funded radio station reported Tuesday.

The plan comes as the U.N. agency prepares to launch an emergency operation to help feed 3.5 million starving North Koreans by providing 310,000 tons of food within the next year.

The WFP plans to keep 59 agents in the North, an increase from the previous 10. Up to 60 percent of these agents will be tasked with checking whether the food goes to ordinary people rather than the military in the impoverished state, according to the Voice of America.

Pyongyang’s reclusive Kim Jong-il regime has often refused to let outsiders monitor its food distribution process, triggering suspicions that most of the outside aid is being used to feed its army and political elite.

Apparently getting more desperate for outside assistance, the North has agreed to let the WFP agents monitor its food situations in some 400 regions every month, the U.N. body said.

South Korea and the U.S., which remain lukewarm toward resuming full-scale food aid to Pyongyang, suspect that the Kim regime may be stockpiling rice to prepare for potential war or to release on the 100th anniversary of its late founder Kim Il-sung next year.

While the WFP has been calling on the international community to donate 434,000 tons of food to feed starving North Koreans, the two traditional allies also question the accuracy of the assessment made based on Pyongyang’s own statistics on its harvest and rationing.

Among the newly dispatched agents, 12 can speak fluent Korean, the U.S. radio station said, quoting WFP officials.

A total of seven offices, including one in the capital Pyongyang, will open during the emergency operation period, with food being distributed in eight provinces and 109 districts in the North, it added.

In a recent statement, the WFP had stressed that the aid operation in the authoritarian single-party state “will include the highest standards of monitoring and control to ensure that food gets to where it is needed.”

ORIGINAL POST (2011-5-1): According to the UN press release:

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today announced plans to introduce emergency operations in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) to feed an estimated 3.5 million people in desperate need after crop losses and a particularly bitter winter.

Women and children will be the focus of the one-year WFP operation, which follows an assessment by several aid agencies of food security inside the DPRK, according to a press release issued by the agency. The operation is expected to cost just over $200 million.

UNICEF has launched a $20 million appeal to fund assistance programmes in the five DPRK provinces with the highest rates of malnutrition and in other counties with similar problems.

Although WFP said overall rates of acute malnutrition have not yet reached crisis levels, it warned that the situation could deteriorate rapidly if there is any further reduction in the food intake of those in need.

Many families have already resorted to cutting out the size or number of meals each day, and Government-supplied rations provide only about half of a person’s daily food needs.

“We face a critical window to get supplies into the country and reach the millions who are already hungry,” said Amir Abdulla, WFP’s Deputy Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer.

“Our primary concern is for those who are most vulnerable to shocks in the food supply – children, mothers, the elderly and large families.”

WFP spokesperson Emilia Casella told reporters in Geneva that the assessment found that the severe winter this year had damaged a large proportion of the seed potato stocks needed to plant the next crop.

The vegetable harvest late last year was also down 44 per cent on the expected volume, she said.

Under the operation WFP will provide cereals and the ingredients for the local production of such foods as corn-soy milk, rice-milk blend and high-nutrient biscuits through a public distribution system.

International staff working for the agency will make more than 400 visits each month to provincial markets and distribution points during the operation, and will only have to give 24 hours’ notice to local authorities.

The operation will continue through the harvest expected in October, with specialized nutritious products expected to be distributed then. WFP aims to procure food from neighbouring countries so that it can be distributed as fast as possible.

“WFP has worked in the DPRK for 15 years and we will be drawing on all that experience and expertise to ensure this operation provides vital, timely food and nutrition to those who cannot support themselves through these difficult months,” Mr. Abdulla noted.

UNICEF’s assistance programme will tackle behavioural and structural issues, such as hygiene, infant feeding practices, water and sanitation, as well as direct nutritional needs, agency spokesperson Marixie Mercado said.

Its operation will target more than 400,000 young children and an estimated 165,000 pregnant or lactating women, regarded as among the most vulnerable groups in the current crisis.

Ms. Mercado said the programme will also aim to help children living permanently in institutions as they do not have extended families from which to draw support.

A survey carried out in 2009 found that 32 per cent of DPRK children were stunted, with even higher rates in some rural areas.

Additionally, Greta Van Susteren (Fox News) has announced that she is returning to the DPRK soon. She always travels with Samaritan’s Purse, so they will probably be launching a program in the DPRK as well. (SMALL UPDATE: Samaritan’s Purse announced they are launching a program) Wouln’t it be nice if they got get to see Jun, the American detained in the DPRK–reportedly for clandestine evangelism.

The South Korean and US governments have hesitated in providing food aid this spring but they seem to be allowing limited private aid.

There is some debate as to how severe the food shortage is and what should/could be done about it. Articles from all sides of the debate are cataloged here.

Posted in Food, Foreign aid statistics, International Aid, UN, UN World Food Program, UNICEF | 3 Comments »

Lankov on private farming in the DPRK

Monday, April 25th, 2011

Pictured above on Google Earth: hill-side farming plots in the DPRK

Lankov writes in the Korea Times:

Every visitor to North Korea who has passed through mountainous areas in the country has seen some peculiarities of the modern North Korean landscape.

Somewhere high in the mountains one can see small fields of strange, irregular shapes which look quite different from the orderly, rectangular shapes of the cooperative farm fields. If asked about these fields, North Korean minders will probably avoid giving a straight answer. This is understandable ― even though the existence of such fields is tacitly accepted by the authorities, from a purely ideological view, which minders are obliged to present, these fields are not supposed to exit.

We are referring to sotoji, private plots, which have been spreading across North Korea over the last 15 years and now play a major role in food production in North Korea.

It would be only a minor exaggeration to say that in his policies, Kim Il-sung tended to be more Stalinist than Joseph Stalin himself. He took the state-run economy to its natural (or unnatural) extreme and collective farming was no exception. Once upon a time, the North Korean peasantry was herded into so-called “agricultural cooperatives.” The description of these institutions as cooperatives is actually misleading because they were essentially state-run farms, where farmers had basically no influence over management or income distribution.

But North Korea has one important peculiarity: unlike Stalin’s Soviet Union, in North Korea farmers were not allowed to cultivate even small private plots. In the Soviet Union a farming family would be allowed a plot which might have been as large as a few thousand square meters. In North Korea, the maximum size of an individual plot was limited to a paltry 100 square meters – barely enough to grow some pepper and spice and clearly not enough to make any meaningful economic difference.

This was done on purpose ― North Korean policy planners assumed that farmers, being deprived of any alternative means of existence, would work more efficiently in state-owned fields. In agricultural cooperatives farmers essentially worked for their daily ration ― one full day of work was rewarded with 700g of grain (similar to the ration of the average worker in a city).

This system was never especially efficient but for a few decades it managed to exist and function somehow. However the collapse of the North Korean economy in the early 1990s produced a devastating blow to state-run agriculture. In 1995 and 1996 the harvests were around half of what was necessary to keep the North Korean population alive, so many North Koreans starved to death (the exact numbers are disputed but it seems that between 500,000-1,000,000 perished) and the survivors began to look for ways to make a living outside the state-run-economy. Predictably enough, farmers did what one would expect them to do ― they began to develop their own food production.

Unlike their Chinese counterparts, the North Korean elite refused to disband the state-run agricultural cooperatives. Therefore farmers had no choice but to acquire land on their own, outside of what would be normally considered arable land. Usually they went to the mountains, since all arable land in the valleys had long been cultivated within state-run farms.

In some cases, farmers would make agreements with local forestry departments whose officials agreed to turn a blind-eye to unlawful activities in protected forest areas. In some other cases the local authorities tolerated and even encouraged the sotoji cultivators.

A quick look through satellite images of North Korea shows the widespread nature of the sotoji phenomena. In some counties near the Chinese border, the percentage of land under the cultivation of sotoji owners roughly equals that under cultivation by state-run farms. In other areas the level of private production may be smaller but it seems clear that private food production makes a major contribution to North Korea’s food supply today.

Indeed, in the above-mentioned borderland counties, sotoji fields seem to produce as much as 60 percent of all food sold on the local market. This might be an exception because the current county in question is covered by mountains and contains a lot of places where people can hide from police. Nonetheless sotoji produced food is found widely in the country’s markets.

In the last 15 years or so, North Koreans have developed a large and successful private economy of which the sotoji phenomenon is an important part. However their cultivators are not high on the newly emerging social ladder. Sotoji are usually tilled by people who do not have the money, skills or inclination to start a more conventional business. Some of them are essentially market-orientated enterprises which make profit but the majority lose money.

Nonetheless, the random new shapes of North Korean mountains nowadays are yet another reminder of how much the country has changed over the last two decades.

Read the full story here:
Sotoji — small private plot
Korea Times
Andrei Lankov
2011-4-24

Posted in Agriculture, Economic reform, Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Russia | Comments Closed

DPRK seafood still available in ROK

Monday, April 25th, 2011

Accordign to the Choson Ilbo:

Clams and other seafood from North Korea are openly being sold in the South despite a ban on all trade with the North after the sinking of the Navy corvette Cheonan last year. Insiders say that is because customers prize North Korean fisheries products.

Some 30 vendors in the Garak Market and 20 in the Noryangjin Fisheries Wholesale Market sell shellfish from North Korea, including large clams and scallops. “We have openly labeled shellfish that come from North Korea because customers think they taste better,” a vendor said. “They’re between W1,000 to W3,000 cheaper than domestic ones but the quality is good” (US$1=W1,081).

North Korean shellfish have been brought into the South labeled as Chinese since the end of March. “Before the sinking of the Cheonan, North Korean shellfish was directly imported” labeled as North Korean, an official at the Seoul Agricultural and Marine Products Corporation said. “But since the ban on North Korean imports they’ve been imported through Chinese traders.”

According to the National Fisheries Research and Development Institute, demand for fish and shellfish from North Korea is rising in the South because customers shun Japanese seafood products due to concerns over radioactive contamination, while there are suspicions over the quality of Chinese products.

You can read the Choson Ilbo piece here:
N.Korean Shellfish Sold Openly Despite Ban
Choson Ilbo
4/25/2011

Posted in Agriculture, Agriculture statistics, Food, International trade, Trade Statistics | Comments Closed

DPRK 2011 foot and mouth disease outbreak

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011

UPDATE 6 (2011-4-20): The DPRK is experiencing a new wave of foot and mouth outbreaks. According to Yonhap:

A new outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) occurred in four counties in North Korea last month and infected nearly 300 pigs and cows, a news report said Wednesday.

A total of 141 out of 298 animals died after being infected with the disease, the Voice of America said, citing a North Korean report submitted to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) on Monday. The news report said Pyongyang quarantined the infected areas in an apparent attempt to stem the spread of the disease.

The North confirmed its first case of the disease in December, and the virus has since spread to six other cities and provinces, Seoul’s Agriculture Minister Yoo Jeong-bok said in February.

Last month, the World Organization for Animal Health said North Korea urgently needed around US$1 million worth of equipment and vaccines to help stem outbreaks of the deadly disease.

The disease does not pose a direct health threat to humans, but affects cows, sheep, goats and other cloven-hoofed animals, causing blisters on the nose, mouth, hooves and teats.

North Korea has 577,000 heads of cattle, 2.2 million pigs and 3.5 million goats, according to the OIE.

The OIE data mentioned in the above Yonhap story can be found here.

The OIE provides the map below as well as details about the outbreaks:

Three of the four cases take place in North Hwanghae:

Sinphyong county, Myongri district (2011-3-21)

Sangwon county, Rodong-ri (2011-3-16)

Hwangju county, Ryongchon-ri (2011-4-4)

The final case is in Singyo-ri, Kumgang County, Kangwon Province. It reportedly took place on 2011-4-6.

The data is also available here.

UPDATE 5 (2011-3-24): UN FAO Press Release:

North Korea: FAO says urgent vaccine and equipment needed to contain Foot-and-Mouth Disease

Capacity of national veterinary services to manage animal disease must also be strengthened

24 March 2010, Rome/Paris – Around a million dollars of equipment and vaccines are urgently required to help stem outbreaks of deadly Foot-and-Mouth disease (FMD) in North Korea, followed by a more prolonged and concerted effort to modernize veterinary services in the country.

A joint FAO and World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) mission travelled to North Korea at the government’s request between 27 February and 8 March. The mission found that the country’s capacity and that of veterinary services to detect and contain FMD outbreaks need significant strengthening — in particular as regards implementing best-practices in biosecurity measures and improving laboratory infrastructure and capacity.

Outbreaks of Type-O FMD have been reported in diverse locations in eight of North Korea’s 13 provinces. To bring the situation under control, the team recommended the following steps:

Thorough surveillance to locate and map disease clusters

Protecting unaffected farms through movement controls and biosecurity measures

Adequate sampling in order to correctly identify the virus strain or strains involved

Improving biosecurity measures to prevent further spread of the disease

The strategic use of the appropriate vaccines to contain and isolate disease clusters

FAO estimates around $1 million is required immediately for training, supplies and infrastructure, vaccine acquisition and the setting up of monitoring, reporting and response systems.

The FAO-OIE mission visited several collective farms as well as the national veterinary laboratory and various animal health field stations.

Virus identification

FAO and OIE provided guidance to North Korean veterinary authorities on taking and handling of FMD samples — new samples will be collected by North Korea and sent to an international reference laboratory for testing.

Only by accurately typing the virus or viruses involved in the outbreaks will it be possible to identify the most effective vaccine to use against it.

Food security bulwark

FMD does not pose a direct health threat to humans, but affected animals become too weak to be used to plough the soil or reap harvests, suffer significant weight loss, and produce less milk. Many animals are dying from the disease.

Farm animals are crucial to food security in North Korea. Cows and oxen are primarily used for dairy production and are a key source of draft power in agricultural production. Goats and pigs, also susceptible to FMD, are important source of dairy products and meat.

Current North Korea’s livestock population consists of 577,000 head of cattle, 2.2 million pigs and 3.5 million goats.

FMD affects cattle, buffaloes, sheep, goats, swine and other cloven-hoofed animals. It is highly contagious and spreads through mucus, saliva or body fluids that can contaminate materials such as clothing, crates, truck beds, and hay and be transmitted to other animals.

UPDATE 4 (2011-3-22): Pork prices rising with FMD meat on sale. According to the Daily NK:

With North Korea seemingly unable to bring an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease centered on the Pyongyang region under control, inside sources have revealed that the price of good pork in the markets is skyrocketing as a result of diminishing supplies, while infected meat is being sold on the quiet for lower prices.

Speaking with The Daily NK on the 22nd, a source from North Pyongan Province explained, “Pork is right now selling for 6,000 won per kilo in the market. The price, which was 2,600 won in the market last December, is climbing all the time, and now is at the point where the average person has no chance of being able to buy it.”

According to sources, the situation is similar in Nampo, where pork was selling for 3,500 won in December, but had reached 6,500 won by February. In Sariwon in North Hwanghae Province, the price had hit 5,000 won by the end of February.

The news of an emerging foot-and-mouth disease problem in North Korea first emerged through sources earlier this year, but the authorities only confirmed it officially and reported control measures via Chosun Central News Agency on February 10th.

According to an official report submitted by the North Korean authorities to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) at around the same time, the outbreak had by then spread to 48 places across much of south and central North Korea, with 15 of those places falling within the Pyongyang administrative region.

The report outlined how North Korea first attempted to combat the outbreak with an indigenously produced vaccine, but this was of limited use. It also noted that official North Korean policy is to bury those animals that die from the disease and quarantine those that are infected.

However, inside sources say that in reality people are digging up buried animals in order to sell the meat in the market at a lower price.

The North Pyongan Province source explained, “Meat infected with foot-and-mouth disease is being sold in the market tacitly; the price of it is somewhat lower. The work of burying pigs with foot-and-mouth disease is being done, he said, but it is said that animals continue to be dug up and are sometimes being sold in the market.”

The source gave the example of a pig farm in Pyongsung, where 6 people dug up previously buried pigs last December to sell in Pyongsung Market. They were selling the meat for 2,000 won/kg, he said, but were caught by the authorities.

The source also revealed that on December 30th, 2010, 500 pigs were buried near Pyongyang, but two days later had disappeared, while in Sinuiju it is said that “If it is buried in the daytime, people say that by that very evening it will appear in the market.”

Of course, the fact is that the North Korean authorities are unable to put in place an efficacious policy to combat the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease or the selling on of infected meat, not least because persons caught for selling infected meat can simply navigate their way out of trouble and go back to their activities.

UPDATE 3 (2011-3-2): A UN FAO team is in the DPRK to inspect the foot-and-mouth outbreak. According to the Joongang Ilbo:

An official at the FAO was quoted by RFA as saying that the scale and variety of the aid would be determined after discussions with North Korean government officials. The exact itinerary of the group was not released.

The UN food agency also said that along with the team that arrived in North Korea last month, additional officials, including an expert on contagious diseases, would be sent to the area.

The South Korean government has said that it has been monitoring the development of the outbreak. However, the South Korean Ministry of Unification said after North Korea’s official report on the disease that Pyongyang has not made any requests for aid nor did Seoul have plans to offer any assistance.

North Korea announced on Feb. 10 that over 10,000 pigs and cattle had been infected with FMD, prompting North Korean officials to alert the UN of the outbreak.

The North struggled with FMD cases in 2007 and 2008, which led to the culling of thousands of pigs and cattle. During those episodes, the FAO and the South Korean government provided aid.

UPDATE 2 (2011-2-27): The Daily NK reports that the OIE report shows animals are not being culled:

Unlike in 2007, when North Korea reacted swiftly to an outbreak of the disease by culling animals, this time the authorities appear to have reacted poorly despite the fact that the disease has now been found at more than 48 locations in Pyongyang City and Pyongan, Hwanghae and Kangwon Provinces.

According to an OiE report derived from the letter, in which the North finally confirmed the rumored outbreak after a month of silence, Pyongyang has apparently tried to address the situation using a combination of disinfection measures and a domestically produced vaccine, but this has met with little success.

“Given the number of livestock which have died of foot-and-mouth disease, it is uncertain just how far the infection has spread,” Korea Rural Economic Institute Vice-President Kwon Tae Jin explained to The Daily NK. “The small number of infected heads of cattle reported by North Korea is also difficult to accept at face value.”

“If the North Korean authorities have not destroyed the infected cows and pigs in the hope that they will recover, then it is a serious problem. It means we have no idea how far the disease has spread,” Kwon added.

15 of the existing locations in which the disease has so far been detected are in Pyongyang and surrounding areas. In order to combat the spread of the disease to other regions, the authorities are said to have implemented across-the-board restrictions on movement into and out of the city.

However, news of the disease has still not been reported officially, and domestic sources have told The Daily NK that they have not heard anything about it to date.

UPDATE 1 (2011-2-18): DPRK report (below) shows extensive damage from foot-and-mouth disease. According to Yonhap:

North Korea has reported to a global animal health agency that it had suffered a total of 48 outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) since Christmas last year.

The impoverished communist state made the report to the Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) on Feb. 8, saying about half of 17,522 “susceptible” pigs had died from the disease.

Only 3 percent of 1,403 cows suspected of being infected had died from the disease, according to the report posted on the OIE Web site, while none of the 165 susceptible goats had died.

At the time the report was filed, no livestock were yet culled as a preventive measure, according to the report created by Ri Kyong-gun, a quarantine director for the Ministry of Agriculture. A map of outbreaks showed the disease had spread out over almost half of North Korea.

“Vaccination has been applied with a locally developed vaccine but was not effective to control the disease,” the report said, adding that the origin of the outbreak remains “unknown or inconclusive.”

North Korea has banned the inflow of pork and beef from South Korea since late last year for fear that the disease — rampant south of the heavily armed border — may spread there.

Despite the measure, the North, which suffers serious food shortages, reported the outbreak to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization earlier this year.

The country said in the OIE report that it has restricted movement and conducted “disinfection of infected premises and establishments” to fight the spread of the animal disease.

In 2007, North Korea suffered similar outbreaks, prompting South Korea to dispatch a team of animal health experts amid a mood of reconciliation.

FMD is highly contagious and affects cloven-hoofed animals like cattle, pigs, deer, goats and sheep. The disease causes blisters on the mouth and feet of livestock and leads to death. It is rarely transmitted to humans.

ORIGINAL POST (2011-2-18): Below is a map and list of reported foot and mouth disease outbreaks in the DPRK:

The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) has reported 48 outbreaks of foot and mouth disease (FMD) in Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

The outbreaks are located in:

–Kangwon (Anbyon, Kimhwa, Phangyo, Phyonggang)
–Kumgang
–Pyongyang (Sadong, Ryokpo, Rakrang, Kangdong, Mangyongdae)
–Nampho (Nampho and Kangso)
–North Hwanghae (Kangnam, Sangwon, Hwangju, Yonsan, Sinphyong, Suan, Songrim)
–North Pyongan (Thaechon, Pakchon)
–South Hwanghae (Chongdan)
–South Pyongan (Anju, Phyongwon)

The OIE posted a report developed from an official letter sent by the DPRK dated 7 February 2011 and received on 8 February 2011. You can see the OIE report here.

Posted in Agriculture, Agriculture statistics, Disease prevention, Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Health care, International trade, Ministry of Agriculture, UN, UN Food and Agriculture Organization | 3 Comments »

DPRK owes ROK appx $1billion

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011

According to the Choson Ilbo:

North Korea owes South Korea more than W1 trillion in terms of food and other loans, it emerged Tuesday (US$1=W1,092). The North has to start repaying the debt from June next year, but given its economic difficulties and strained inter-Korean relations it is unlikely that Seoul will see a penny.

According to the Unification Ministry, the Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun administrations gave the North 2.4 million tons of rice and 200,000 tons of corn from 2000 to 2007 on condition of repayment over a period of 20 years with a 10-year grace period at a 1 percent annual interest. The loans amount to US$720.04 million, with the interest reaching $155.28 million.

The South Korean government also spent W585.2 billion from the Inter-Korean Cooperation Fund to re-link cross-border railways and roads from 2002 to 2008. Of the total, W149.4 billion worth of materials and equipment for construction on the North Korean side are also loans to be repaid on the same conditions.

Besides, Seoul lent the North $80 million worth of raw materials for production of textile, footwear, and soap in 2007 and 2008. At the time, the North paid back 3 percent of the loan with 1,005 tons of zinc ingots worth $2.4 million, leaving a $77.6 million balance.

All told, the principal on these loans amounts to W1.02 trillion and the total debt including interest to over W1.2 trillion.

The first repayment of $5.83 million for the food loans provided between October 2000 and March 2001 is due on June 7 next year.

A ministry official said, “The amount has already been included in next year’s revenue plan, on the assumption that it will be paid back. If the North fails to pay, it will be deemed outstanding balance.”

Aside from the food and economic loans, the South also lent the North W1.37 trillion through the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization from 1998 to 2006 for the construction of a light-water nuclear reactor. The money was raised by issuing government bonds. The total amount of all loans adds up to W2.25 trillion, if the accrued interest of W877.2 billion is counted.

But since the KEDO project was scrapped in 2006, there is no way for the South to get the money back. It seems likely that the total amount will be handled as “irredeemable government bonds” that have to be made up for with tax money.

Read the full story here:
Pyongyang Owes Seoul Huge Amounts of Money
Choson Ilbo
2011-4-20

Posted in Banking, Debt, Finance, Fiscal & monetary policy, Food, International trade, Railways, South Korea, Statistics, Trade Statistics, Transportation | Comments Closed

KPA soldiers reportedly buying time off

Friday, April 15th, 2011

According to the Daily NK:

It has been revealed that if a Chosun People’s Army soldier is able to provide his military base with a fixed quantity of food, he is able to obtain an extended vacation.

A source from Pyongyang explained to the situation to The Daily NK on the 14th, “There has been this system since October last year; soldiers can get a 15-day vacation by offering 100kg of corn to their military base.”

“Now all soldiers from wealthy households can do their military service at home,” he added.

According to the source, military commanders see the policy as killing three birds with one stone, because not only is the base provided with food, but also when a soldier goes home the base can save the amount of food he would have been given during that period, and when he comes back to base after the vacation he is likely to bring some money with him. Higher military authorities apparently know what is going on, but do not try to stop it.

Another source from North Hamkyung Province has confirmed at least one case of the policy in action, reporting to The Daily NK, “My nephew was doing his military service in Hwanghae Province but then got surgery during a fifteen-day break. But he needed one month more vacation, so he offered 200kg of corn to the base.”

He added, “On the base where my nephew serves, each solder gets 550g of corn everyday and the military almost always tells them to go off-base to solve the problem of lunch for themselves, at neighboring farms or wherever.”

Although it was not previously so systematic, it is not actually new for rich households to provide food to the military in exchange for time off.

One defector, Choi, who served in the headquarters of an anti-aircraft machine gun corps in Pyongyang before coming to Seoul in 2010, told The Daily NK, “In 2007 I went home for three months after my father offered 500kg of corn to my base. It was possible because he was the Propaganda Secretary of a collective farm. Other soldiers’ families were not in such good condition, and they couldn’t even imagine spending that much time at home.”

Meanwhile, the current situation in the military is driving other soldiers to thievery. The same source explained that soldiers now openly say that they have to take care of themselves even if that means stealing, since they have no money and therefore cannot get a vacation.

The Pyongyang source also explained that even Pyongyang bases now only feed soldiers corn, and revealed that as a result, “The number of soldiers getting swollen faces from malnutrition and deserting is increasing.”

He added, “They tend to steal things from civilians’ homes and are not reluctant to assault civilians who refuse to accept their demands.” Therefore, the source said, “General people call them not ‘the People’s Army,’ but ‘Thief Army’ or ‘Bandits.’”

The source also explained, meanwhile, “Rich parents get their sons out via discharges due to illness, something which is done with large bribes.”

Given the dire military food situation, there are also many cases of parents offering bribes to military cadres in order to put their sons in charge of food storage, according to the source. Manager of food storage is the best position on the base, and therefore fiercely competitive.

Read the full story here:
Offer 100kg Corn, Get 15-Day Vacation
Daily NK
Park Jun Hyeong and Lee Seok Young
2011-4-15

Posted in Food, Military | Comments Closed

Official holiday gifts for sale in marketplace

Thursday, April 14th, 2011

For the last few years, stories have appeared in the media about people selling their official 2.16 and 4.15 holiday gifts from the leaders.

The Daily NK gets the first story this time around:

“Is it true that Day of the Sun gifts are being sold in the jangmadang?”

Most defectors answer to that question is something like, “Isn’t it obvious; selling them can give us enough money for one kilogram of rice?” In the past, gifts from Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il on national holidays used to be quite precious and an honor for the people, but now they have become a way to lessen difficulties.

According to defectors, special stalls selling “Day of the Sun gifts” have even appeared.

Even the annual crackdown on selling such gifts is a mere formality. Ham In Suk, who came to the South in 2009, said, “The crackdown is carried out temporarily, but it is not effective and not particularly problematic.”

On the biggest national holidays, the Day of Sun and Kim Jong Il’s birthday, the authorities present gifts to children in day nurseries (four to five years of age), kindergartens (six year old) and elementary students (seven to eleven years old).

In one pack, there are usually around 400g of cookies, 400g of candy, 50g of jellies, 100g of rice crackers and five pieces of gum, although the quality and quantity of gifts differs by province.

A ceremony for giving the gifts to children is held a few days before the birthday in kindergartens, and elementary schools, meaning roughly February 14th and April 13th.

Then, on the afternoon of the day when the ceremony finishes you can easily find gifts in the jangmadang. People sell them to traders for a comparatively cheap price decided by weight.

A one-kilogram pack is sold for 1500 won, and the traders sell them on for 2000 won. Therefore, people can earn enough for one kilogram of rice by selling one pack of the gifts and thus have a hot dinner with family to commemorate the national holiday.

According to defectors, the General’s gifts have been on sale in the jangmadang since the March of Tribulation. This is because even though food distribution was suspended during that tough period, gifts from Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il continued.

Before that, it was apparently hard to find the gifts in the markets at all, no matter how hard lives were. At that time on the morning of the holiday, parents even made their children bow to portraits of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il before they ate the gifts.

One defector who came to South Korea in 2009 said, “Selling gifts was beyond our imagination before the March of Tribulation, and we even stopped our children from opening the pack of cookies before saying a pledge of loyalty.”

In the 2000s, when people began to purchase Chinese products and food and several kinds of cookies in the jangmadang, the situation for snacks also changed; people in more affluent households sold their gifts from the authorities to the jangamdang to purchase more delicious cookies for their children.

In poor houses, however, parents take the gifts from their children and sell them to get a kilogram of rice. Instead of the General’s gifts, they give their children corn cookies costing around 150 won.

Here are previous posts on this topics.

Read the full story here:
General’s Gifts on Sale in the Jangmadang
Daily NK
Kang Mi Jin
2011-4-14

Posted in Food, Political economy, Price liberalization | Comments Closed

Exchange rate data

Wednesday, April 6th, 2011

The The UN World Food Prgram’s Rapid Food Security Assessment Mission (RFSA) offered some exchange rate data that I thought was worth pointing out:

Currently the official exchange rate is about USD1=KPW100 yet the market rate is closer to USD1=KPW3000. In other words, the redenomination of the national currency that occurred in November 2009 is all but neutralized. The effects of this policy on ordinary citizens appear to be mixed where people with over KPW 100,000 lost their savings. The purpose of such a policy was to control inflation by reducing money supply and to curb the growth in private enterprise. Worker salaries remained the same, but prices were reduced significantly.

The PDS prices were revised downwards in the wake of the currency revaluation making it even more affordable, at least in principle. For example, PDS prices of rice declined from KPW 44 to KPW 24 per kg and maize declined from KPW 24 to KPW 14. At these low prices the issue is the lack of commodities in the market, rather than consumers lacking money to purchase them.

An average worker makes around KPW 3,000 to KPW 4,000 per month. This translates into a dollar per month which only works in DPRK because everything is heavily subsidized and ordinary citizens do not rely on direct purchases of imported commodities. If PDS were to run out of cereals at the end April, people would not have the means to purchase cereals on the black market, where prices are KPW2000 per kilogram of rice and about KPW 1000 for maize. It is highly doubtful that the barter system which is the backbone of this informal economy will be able to withstand a shock of this magnitude over more than a couple of weeks. A humanitarian crisis is the likely outcome of such a series of events.

Posted in Banking, Black markets, Economic reform, Finance, Fiscal & monetary policy, Food, Price liberalization, Public Distribiution System (PDS) | Comments Closed

Some recent material on DPRK markets

Wednesday, March 30th, 2011

First, Kim Song Min (김성민), founder of Free North Korea Radio, has posted another clandestine video of a North Korean market:

You can (probably) see the ten-minute video here. It will not work in China. Again, the market is surprisingly ordinary; lots of fish, potatoes, and greens.

I posted a similar video several weeks ago which you can see here.

Secondly, the March 24th WFP/FAO/UNICEF Rapid Food Security Assessment Mission (PDF of the report here) included some interesting information on the DPRK’s markets:

5.2. Markets
The mission had unprecedented access to markets in the country. All teams spent a considerable amount of time surveying different markets and their attributes. In DPRK there are three main types of markets where people can buy food and non-food stuff: 1) State Shops; 2) Farmer’s Markets; and 3) City Markets.

State Shops
State Shops are open seven days a week to provide families with such essentials like the soyabean sauce, soya-bean paste, and cooking oil at discounted prices. Each household is assigned to a state shop and, for certain commodities, is entitled to a monthly quota that is set by the Ministry of Commerce. Essential food items include: soya-bean sauce (50 grams /person/day); soya-bean paste (30 grams/person/day); and cooking oil (20 grams/person/day).

Whether households can purchase their full allocation primarily depends on availability. For example, many households reported that soya-bean oil has not been available since early February. Others households informed that meat is only available on special occasions like the New Year or the birthdays of Kim Il Sung (15 April) and Kim Jong Il (16 February).

The Peoples Neighborhood Unit (PNU) [Inminban] announces when new supplies arrive and informs the household’s entitlement. Payment is collected from the households and tokens are issued, specifying items and quantities that can be collected from the state shops.

The variety and quantity of food and non-food commodities varies from county to county. Some shops were observed to have other food items for sale, such as wild vegetables, biscuits and salt. The mission observed that State Shops in rural areas have fewer commodities available than those in large urban centres.

The mission also observed non-food commodities in State Shops, including: school supplies, clothes, shoes, blankets, kitchen utensils, ceramics, cigarettes, beer, rice wine, children’s toys, and single-band radios.

Farmers Markets
The Farmers’ Markets occur every ten days or three times each month. Sellers bring their food and non-food produce to the market where they pay a fee of KPW10 to secure a two meter stall for the day. The sale of cereals is officially prohibited. The mission did not observe any cereals being sold. The main food items observed in these markets were vegetables, potatoes, fruits, eggs, meat, fish, lentils and spices. Non-food items included basic farming equipment, woven baskets, school supplies, clothes, knitted socks and gloves.

Any exchange of cereals between households is privately done through barter trade or households who are PDS [Public Distribution System] dependants get cereals as gifts from relatives and friends in Cooperative farms. The surplus cereal produced by the farmers over and above their grain allocation for home consumption has to be sold to the State Food Procurement Agency.

Some sellers were able to quote terms of barter trade including: two kilograms of maize can be exchanged for one kilogram of rice; one kilogram of fish can be exchanged for one kilogram of rice; one-half kilogram of pork meat can be exchanged for one kilogram of rice; and five eggs can be exchanged for one kilogram of rice. Sellers were hesitant to quote rice and maize prices in KPW other than what is paid through the PDS.

Interestingly sellers only brought commodities in small quantities despite the fact that these markets happen only three times a month. The number of sellers out numbered the buyers but that could be the mission effect as people were wary of foreigners asking questions, particularly outside Pyongyang. The difference in the prices paid in these rural markets compared to Tongil market in Pyongyang was astounding. A bundle of spinach that cost KPW 20 in rural market was being sold for KPW 1000 in Tongil market—50 times more. However, this may not be of concern to ordinary citizens as Tongil caters more to the foreigners and DPRK elite.

City Markets
City markets are held daily in cities and often in the same structures as the farmers markets.Mission members did not observe any cereals for sale in the market. Food items observed were potato, vegetables, pulses, wild vegetables, seafood, fish, eggs, and meat, including rabbit, chicken, and duck. Non-food items included farming tools, baskets, brooms, school supplies, clothing, and other household items. Commodities were available in small quantities speaking to the size of the market. The prices in these markets were competitive and the produce similar to the farmers market.

Finally, Yonhap reports on the travels of a British Envoy to the DPRK:

Martin Uden, Britain’s ambassador to South Korea, said Sunday that a marketplace in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, appear to be stocked with large amounts of food, poultry and electronic products, despite the communist state’s ongoing search for food aid abroad.

Uden, who traveled to Pyongyang and Wonsan, a port on North Korea’s east coast, from March 11-14, said he witnessed plenty of chicken, fish and vegetables and an array of computer and camera accessories during his visit to the “Dong-il” market in the capital city.

In his travelogue that was written after his second trip to the North following the first in 2008 and sent to Yonhap News Agency, Uden said that overall, both the variety and quantity of food products available at the Pyongyang market were a “fair bit less” compared with three years ago, noting the absence of beef was especially noticeable.

“This March, I saw no beef and a tiny amount of pork. But plenty of chicken of all sizes, both cooked and uncooked, and some duck. Large amounts of good-looking fish and plentiful root vegetables,” the British diplomat said in his travelogue that offers insights into the daily life of ordinary Pyongyang citizens.

“In terms of the food aid that the DPRK is seeking at present, it’s worth remembering that even if this one market appeared reasonably stocked, it’s not possible to draw wider conclusions from that,” he said, using the abbreviation of the North’s official name.

Uden said he arrived in Pyongyang on the second Friday of March, the day of a devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, but was kept in the dark about the disaster until Monday, when the state news organizations carried reports about it. He called the incident an eloquent example of information control by the government.

“In (North Korea), you can only know what the state wants you to know,” he said.

The full text of his travelogue can be found here.

Posted in Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Public Distribiution System (PDS) | Comments Closed

North Korea Resumes Military Rice Procurement Drive from January

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
NK Brief No. 11-03-23
3/23/2011

A nationwide drive for military rice procurement was reported to have resumed from January this year in North Korea. The DPRK authorities halted the collection of rice for the military early last year with a sharp decrease in food production after suffering from repeated flood damages. However with their efforts to find aid from China and other foreign means to little avail, restarted the military procurement from early this year, collecting 2 to 3 USD worth of rice per person on a national level. North Koreans are reported to be strongly against the resurgence of the collection.

According to the Daily NK, sources from Pyongyang revealed that “Orders came from the Central Committee of the Party last December to begin a nationwide collection from January on the grounds of deficient military food supply. Although the order encouraged the drive to be voluntary and not obligatory, the department in charge of procurement is placing pressure on merchants and workers and officials of various corporations for donation.”

The Pyongyang source added, “In the case of Jung District Market (Jungguyeok Market) [satellite image here], the merchants were coerced into paying additional forty to fifty thousand KPW per person. The police are pressuring people that those who fail to pay will be forced to leave their lucrative spot in the market and replaced by those that paid.” Given the price of rice at the end of February was 1,900 KPW per/kg, each merchants was donating about 20 to 25kg of rice to the military.

On the other hand, workers in corporations were paying about 10 kg/person while the cadres were instructed to pay 30 kg/person. “The authorities did not hesitate to criticize and condemn those who dawdled on paying,” the source disclosed.

Another source from Sariwon in North Hwanghae Province also confirmed the account, “The Central Committee instructed the donations to be based on people’s consciences, but local authorities are demanding ‘each person must give specified kilos of rice,’ and ‘those that paid over a ton (1,000 kg), were given party membership right there and then with no inquiries about the source of the rice.”

Thus far, two people were reported to have given ten tons of rice and corn each, 50 people offered two tons of rice, and 200 people donated one ton of rice.

The source further added, the Party’s original target of 800 tons of rice for Sariwon was exceeded by a large margin, reaching over 2,400 tons.

However, disgruntled voices of North Koreans are also reported to be heard for the half-forced “military rice procurement drive,” raising questions about “where the food was going,” and “unhappy about taking rice for the military when there are no food rations for the people and factories no longer in operation.”

Previous stories on the DPRK’s food situation this year can be found here.

Posted in Central Committee, Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Institute for Far Eastern Studies, Military, Worker's Party | 1 Comment »

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