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UN update on North Korea’s food situation

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

The country has a grain shortfall of 1.66 million metric tons this year, the United Nations agency said in a statement today, citing figures from the Food and Agriculture Organization. The shortfall was the highest since 2001, it said.

“It takes a third of a month’s salary just to buy a few days’ worth of rice,” Jean-Pierre de Margerie, the WFP’s country representative in North Korea, said in the statement. The situation is “not yet” on the scale of the 1990s famine but “yellow lights have to be flashed,” he added in an interview.

The Asian nation’s food deficit may exacerbate a global grain crisis that has driven prices of wheat and rice to records, stoking inflation and sparking civil unrest. International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said April 12 that “hundreds of thousands” may starve worldwide.

Prices of staple foods in the North Korean capital have doubled over the past year following floods last August that reduced agricultural output, the WFP statement said. Last year’s harvest was a quarter less than that gathered in 2006, it said.

The WFP assists about 1.1 million North Koreans at present, while 6.5 million people suffer from “food insecurity,” it said. That “figure can be expected to rise if action is not taken,” the statement said.

Even in normal years North Korea has a deficit of 800,000 to 1 million tons of grain, de Margerie said in today’s interview.

The gap is greater this year because of the flooding and as external assistance has fallen since 2005, when North Korea declared that it could do without humanitarian aid, he said.

People will “resort to any means they can to cope” from growing food at home and trading in the country’s private markets to skipping meals, as many did for long periods in the mid-to-late 1990s leading to high malnutrition rates, de Margerie said. (Bloomberg)

From Time (AP):

The North’s annual food deficit is expected to nearly double from 2007 to 1.83 million tons, according to U.N. projections.

Reflecting the situation, prices for key staples at food markets have also doubled to reach their highest level since 2004, the World Food Program said. Although the communist North provides some food rations to its people, those who can resort to markets to help make up for lacking state handouts.

The WFP also called on the North to allow aid groups to operate more freely in the country. Countries giving food distributed by the WFP require monitoring by aid workers to ensure that those most in need are being fed. (Time )

Read the full articles here:
North Korea Faces Food Crisis, UN Agency Warns
Bloomberg
Bradley Martin
4/16/2008

UN: North Korea Faces Food Crisis
Time
Burt Herman
4/16/2008

Posted in Arduous March, Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Price liberalization, Public Distribiution System (PDS), UN Food and Agriculture Organization, UN World Food Program | Comments Closed

North Korea cracks down on moonshine…

Sunday, April 13th, 2008

According to the Daily NK:

An inside North Korean source relayed that North Korean authorities have stepped up its regulations of “home-brewed wine production and sales” with the purpose of eradicating the food waste by citizens.

Party Inspection Units are looking for all kinds of food waste (marriages, sixtieth-birthday anniversaries, sacrificial rites, and dinners among leaders), but liquor producers and distributors are on the list of targets. Propaganda is being fed to local workers, extolling them not to waste food, and in order to minimize any bribery or favoritism, inspectors are being called from neighboring provinces.

Those prosecuted in the inspections have been levied fines and all of their liquor and materials confiscated (and I really doubt they are pouring it down drains).

Read the whole story here:
North Korea’s Inspection of Home-Brewed Wine by the Party
Daily NK
Jung Kwon Ho
4/9/2008

Posted in Alcohol, Arduous March, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market) | 2 Comments »

When food and politics collide

Sunday, April 13th, 2008

News of the DPRK’s food shortages began to surface several weeks ago when Good Friends reported:

North Korea’s chronic food shortage has worsened to affect even some of the country’s elite citizens in the capital, a South Korean aid group said Thursday.

The communist nation has not given rice rations to medium- and lower-level officials living in Pyongyang this month after cutting the rations by 60 percent in February, the Good Friends aid agency said in its regular newsletter.

Pyongyang citizens are considered the most well-off in the isolated, impoverished country, where the government controls most means of production and operates a centralized ration system. Only those deemed most loyal to Kim Jong Il’s regime are allowed to live in the capital.

The food situation is more serious in rural areas, with residents in many regions in the country’s South Hwanghae province living without food rations since November, the aid group said. (AP)

Why was this the case?

Floods last August ruined part of the main yearly harvest, creating a 25 percent shortfall in the food supply and putting 6 million people in need, according to the U.N. World Food Program.

Over the winter, drought damaged the wheat and barley crop, according to a recent report in the official North Korean media. That crop normally tides people over during the summer “lean season” until the fall harvest.

North Korea’s ability to buy food, meanwhile, has plunged, as the cost of rice and wheat on the global market has jumped to record highs, up 50 percent in the past six months.

China also appears to have tightened its food squeeze on North Korea for domestic reasons. In order to meet local demand and control inflation, Beijing slapped a 22 percent tariff on grain exports to the North. (Washington Post)

So North Korea’s domestic agricultural production has fallen and so have commercial food imports (international inflation, OECD government subsidies for bio-fuels, and increasing fuel prices have combined to raise the prices of commodities such as rice and pork up to 70% in the course of a year).

Compounding this problem, however, agricultural aid from North Korea’s two most reliable benefactors (China and South Korea) has dried up.

[China] has quietly slashed food aid to North Korea, according to figures compiled by the World Food Program. Deliveries plummeted from 440,000 metric tons in 2005 to 207,000 tons in 2006. Last year there was a slight increase in aid, but it remained far below the levels of the past decade. (Washington Post)

And strained relations with the new Lee government in South Korea have not helped:

The South typically sends about 500,000 tonnes of rice and 300,000 tonnes of fertiliser a year. None has been sent this year and without the fertiliser, North Korea is almost certain to see a fall of several tens of tonnes in its harvest (Reuters)

So what will be the mitigating factors that prevent another humanitarian emergency?

“The reason for the mass starvation that occurred in late 90s is that North Korea faced natural disasters without expanding the market’s capability to substitute for the broken planned economy capability, and so the damage to North Korean citizens was inevitably large.”

“The market in North Korea has expanded in the last 10 years. The supply and demand structure of daily necessities, including food items, has been formed.”

“Because the market capacity has expanded, the possibility of a mass-scale starvation occurring is no longer high. In actuality, the change in food prices is being monitored at the market.”

-Dong Yong Seung, the Samsung Economic Research Institute’s Economic Security Team Chief, speaking at the 19th Expert Forum sponsored by the Peace Foundation (Daily NK)

Mr. Dong’s analysis addresses the improved efficiency of DRPK’s market supply chains but does not address the effects of an adverse supply shock.

The UN seems ready to help, although it has not been asked:

Institutionally, mechanisms are in place in North Korea to ring the international alarm bell before hunger turns into mass starvation. The World Food Program monitors nutrition in 50 counties, and the Kim government has become expert in asking for help.

“The North Koreans know that they are facing a difficult situation and have made it increasingly clear in the past few weeks that they will need outside assistance to meet their growing needs,” the U.N. official said, asking not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue.

North Korea, which even with a good harvest still falls about 1 million tonnes, or around 20 percent, short of what it needs to feed its people, relies heavily on aid from China, South Korea and U.N. aid agencies to fill the gap.

The UN official said it was clear from a variety of sources that the food security situation was worsening in North Korea and that it needed to be addressed.

Last month Kwon Tae-jin, an expert on the North’s agriculture sector at the South’s Korea Rural Economic Institute told Reuters that if South Korea and other nations did not send food aid, the North would be faced with a food crisis worse than the one in the 90s.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation said in late March it sees the North having a shortfall of about 1.66 million tonnes in cereals for the year ending in October 2008.

The North will start to feel the shortage the hardest in the coming months when its meagre stocks of food, already depleted by flooding that hit the country last year, dry up and before the start of its potato harvest in June and July. (Washington Post)

The UNWFP, however, will be under pressure from its donors to monitor food aid and make sure it is not diverted to non-emergency uses. Under these conditions, it is not likely that they will be asked to provide much aid until a catastrophy is already underway. So with the UN out of the picture, who is best positioned to prevent the reemergence of a humanitarian crisis in North Korea today? China.

Despite China’s own food probelms, however, it is always likely to capitulate, at least in part, to North Korea’s emergency requests. China does not want to deal with another North Korean famine, particularly during the Olympic season, and they certainly do not want to deal with any political instability that could result.

Yonhap reports that the DPRK has asked the Chinese for 150,000 tons of corn this year. Chinas says they will give 50,000 tons–and that is just initially. (Yonhap)

UPDATE 4/14/2008: I still have not seen any reports in the media of Noth Korea seeking suport from Russia.

UPDATE 6/9/2008: China increases grain export quota to North Korea to 150,000 tons

(more…)

Posted in 1990s Famine, Agriculture, Arduous March, China, Civil society, Economic reform, Food, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Price liberalization, South Korea, UN Food and Agriculture Organization, UN World Food Program | 2 Comments »

The Supreme People’s Assembly to Be Held on the 9th

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

Daily NK
Park In Ho
4/9/2008

The 6th round of the 11th term of Supreme People’s Assembly will be held at Mansudae Assembly Hall on the 9th of April.

The Supreme People’s Assembly consists of 687 delegates from districts, cities, counties, and even sub-organizations of Chongryon (General Association of North Korean Residents in Japan). It also includes Kim Jong Il himself as the delegate of election district number 649.

The 687 delegates of the 11th term were elected in August 2003, and Kim Jong Il, the Top Secretary of the Chosun (North Korea) Workers Party, was also reselected to the de facto presidency of the National Defense Chairman in September of the same year. The term of office is five years, so the 6th round Assembly will be the last one for the 11th term delegates.

During this round, the Assembly is expected to evaluate the Party’s tasks as suggested by the 2008 New Year’s Common Editorial, to settle the year 2007 accounts and to ratify the budget for 2008.

Additionally, they will address more cases adopted by the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly, such as bills, economic issues and foreign affairs.

People pay attention on what kind of blueprints will be suggested, regarding what the New Year’s Common Editorial of this year proposed with regards to the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the regime’s foundation, that is, “We will build ‘the strong great nation’ by 2012 when it will be the 100th year anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth.”

It seems that details of the nuclear programs declaration issue, along with North Korea-U.S. relations and cold relations between the South and the North, will be ignored. However, at least with regard to North-South relations, a resolution supporting the position of the Party may be adopted.

Chief researcher of the Institute for National Security Strategy Lee Ki Dong predicted through a telephone interview with Daily NK that “Although there will not be any presentation on the current issues in North Korea-US relations, they may possibly mention some issues with the South. The most likely way of doing this would be a statement criticizing the ‘Vision 3000: Denuclearization and Openness’ of the Lee Myung Bak administration.”

It is predicted that after the Assembly elects the 12th term of delegates in late 2008, it would rebuild the structure of the national power system by the reselection of Kim Jong Il as the National Defense Chairman.

The delegate’s term of office in the Assembly is 5 years and one delegate per 30,000 people is elected by 100 per cent of favorable votes, with a 100 per cent voting rate. The general laws and ordinances are adopted by a majority vote and a revision of the constitution is ratified by a two-thirds vote of the enrolled delegates.

Posted in 2012 Strong and Prosperous Nation (Kangsong Taeguk), Supreme Peoples Assembly | Comments Closed

An In-depth Look at North Korea’s Postal Service

Tuesday, April 8th, 2008

Daily NK
Moon Sung Hwee
4/8/2008

April 8th is Postal Service Day in North Korea. Each province has a branch office of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications and Communication Maintenance Bureau. The postal system manages the distribution of letters, telegrams, telephone calls, TV broadcasts, newspapers and magazines. Additionally, they mint stamps and also operate an insurance agency in name only.

In the late 1990s, the national postal system was completely ruined

In North Korea, postal service offices are set up in each “ri”—a small village unit–, of each county to deliver letters, parcel posts and telegrams. Following the March of Tribulation in the late 1990s, the delivery system was completely destroyed and its formal structure was left in tatters. Even in the 1980s when the North Korean economy and people’s lives were relatively stable, it took around 15 days to two months on average to deliver a letter from Pyongyang to a rural village.

In the case of a telegram, it took generally 3 or 4 days to reach a postal office in a rural area. In the late 1980s, to guarantee efficiency within the telegram delivery system, the authorities supplied the offices with second-hand bicycles from Japan.

After the March of Tribulation, letters disappeared due to train delays and frequent blackouts, and the telegram service was virtually incapacitated due to the lack of electricity.

Telephones were restricted to control the outflow of national secrets

North Korea uses a separate electricity supply for its telephone system. Even if there is a power blackout in a village, villagers can still use the telephone network. In 1993, fiber-optic cables were installed and the use of mail and telegram services began to decline. North Korean people call fiber optic cable a “light telephone.”

North Korea built an automatic telecommunicates system by developing multi-communication technology with imports of machinery and by inviting engineers from China in 1998.

In 2003, authorities allowed cadres to use telephones in their houses and in 2005, they also allowed people to use the telephone at home as long as they paid 2,000 North Korean won (approx. USD0.6) a month (a monthly salary is 1,500 won per laborer).

In August, 2007, the government tightened regulations regarding the telephone system. People could make calls only within their province. Authorities said the reason was to prevent the outflow of national secrets.

The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications controls TV and other broadcasting. There is no cable TV in North Korea. Authorities set up an ultra-short wave relay station in each county to relay television broadcasts.

North Korea signed a contract with Thailand for satellite broadcasting and installed U.S.-made transmission and relay facilities in 2000.

People can now listen to “Chosun Central Broadcasting,” but in rural areas, it is difficult to recieve signals because the broadcasting facilities and cables have already begun to deteriorate.

People sarcastically say a “newspaper is not about news but about “olds.” The authorities pay special attention to the successful delivery of the Workers Party Rodong Shinmun bulletin. To deliver Rodong Shinmun from Pyongyang to each province or even to each city and county by train, it normally takes 4-5 days. Sometimes, it takes more than a week.

People also say they use an “oral-paper” to get information because rumors are faster than the Rodong Shinmun.

Postal service workers were dragged to prison camps

In 1992, the Minister and all related officials of Posts and Telecommunications were fired, and the Minister, the Vice Minister and their families were sent to political prison camps for having wasted national finances for the import of factory machinery to produce fiber-optic cables from the U.K.

They submitted a proposal to Kim Jong Il to buy factory machines in order to earn foreign currency through the production and export of fiber optic cables. However, in the end they eventually bought worn-out machines from the U.K. and failed to earn profits. In addition, they embezzled some of the funds.

In 2001, in Lee Myung Soo Workers-District of Samjiyeon, Yangkang Province, two office workers and a manager of a relay station broadcasted Chinese TV programs that they were watching to residents by mistake, so they were sent to a political prison camp and their families were expelled to a collective farm.

Agents of the National Security Agency are stationed at the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications in order to scrutinize mail, parcels, to tap telephone wires and to supervise residents.

The Ministry regularly dispatches professional engineers to the 27th Bureau, to the airwaves-monitoring station, and to the 12th Bureau, which was newly established to censor mobile phones.

On Postal Service Day, Chosun Central Agency often delivers praise for the development of North Korea’s postal system and facilities under the General’s direction.

However, most ordinary citizens will not be able to watch or read about it in time, for the lack of paper, electricity, infrastructure, and delivery systems.

Posted in 1990s Famine, Arduous March, Bicycles, Communications, Ministry of Post and Telecommunications, Radio, Railways, Telephones, Television | Comments Closed

DPRK promotes multifaceted trade to boost exports

Thursday, March 27th, 2008

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
NK Brief No. 08-3-27-1
3/27/2008

The latest issue of the North Korean publication “Economic Research” (2008, issue no. 1) highlights the need to restructure North Korea’s trade system in order to meet the demands of the capitalist market. The journal quotes Kim Jong Il as saying, “[We] need fresh improvement, in our own manner, of the basic Socialist economy’s trade system of yesterday, meeting the current demands being faced due to the capitalist market.”

Therefore, the journal stresses, “As the socialist market crumbles, and given the demands of the capitalist market as [our] focus shifts to overseas economic relations, what is currently needed for the development of overseas trade is improvement of our own style to the trade system that can ensure large profits.

The journal goes on to recommend that, in order to meet these new demands of the international capitalist market, “the most important thing is improving the import-export system based on the foundation of an self-reliant national economy.” It states that raw materials should not be sold as-is, but rather should be turned into processed goods and then sold, that goods popular on the international market should be manufactured for export, and that niches should be chosen in which North Korean goods can dominate the international market.

However, the journal also says, “If individual offices trade with capitalists outside the scope of government controls, ‘reform’ and ‘opening’ sought by the imperialists would occur, and the nation’s economy could liberalize and capitalize…International trade must take place orderly under the uniform control and guidance of the nation.”

The journal asserts that even though a variety of offices are engaged in trade, they must first receive government permission, follow government guidelines, and operate in a government-created environment. The central government must standardize prices and designs of selected export goods from each trading company.

Posted in Domestic publication, Economic reform, International trade, Light Industry, Manufacturing, Mining/Minerals, Songun | Comments Closed

Women and police clash in DPRK Markets

Saturday, March 22nd, 2008

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
NK Brief No. 08-3-22-1
3/22/2008

Recently, North Korea passed a measure prohibiting women younger then 49 from selling goods in markets, leading to clashes between police enforcing the rule and younger women wanting to work in markets.

The March 19th newsletter from ‘Good Friends’, an organization providing aid for North Korea, reported that on February 5th in Haeju, South Hwanghae Province, women who were not allowed to enter the local market and so were selling goods on a nearby corner physically clashed and police. This reportedly led to the arrest and detention of 9 people.

The newsletter reported, “The women held at the police station were subjected to harsh interrogation as to ‘who was the ringleader’, and after being subjected to four days of torture, one who could no longer hold out confessed to being the ringleader and was sent to a detention center, while the remaining women were all released.”

North Korean authorities announced the measure restricting women under 49 from selling goods in markets after December 1st last year, and that measure is being enforced not only in Pyongyang, but in rural areas as well.

According to Good Friends, “Just like other cities, Haeju City has received absolutely no food rations since March,” and “Women from households barely managing regular meals through market trading are being reduced to the weakest level by North Korean authorities’ prohibition on trading.”

It follows that in Haeju City, either authorities recognize that if these women can not sell in the markets their families will starve to death and so turn a blind eye to their activities, or these women, prevented from selling in markets, will continue to clash with authorities.

The newsletter also reported, “On March 3, in Chungjin City, North Hamkyung Province, organized protests by women prevented from market activities by the new regulations broke out, and Chungjin City authorities are now allowing all women, with no exception, to sell goods in markets.”

Immediately following organized protests by these women, Chungjin City officials reported the disturbances, but no policies to deal with the issue were forthcoming, and so it appears that all women, with no exception, are now allowed to conduct market activities.

Posted in 2002 Economic reforms, Civil society, General markets (FMR: Farmers Market), Institute for Far Eastern Studies, Price liberalization, Private property, Public Distribiution System (PDS) | 1 Comment »

1946 Land Reform and early DPRK state…

Sunday, March 9th, 2008

Dr. Lankov publishes some great information on the relationship between the early DPRK state and the Soviet Union…

[F]rom the very start the land reform program in North Korea was planned by the Soviet military authorities, and Kim Il-sung simply signed the documents, which had been prepared for him by the Russian officers.

This fact is well-known, since Russian papers on the land reform issue were declassified and published in South Korea almost a decade ago.

and…

[E]ven a cursory look through the available documents clearly indicates: in 1945-1950, the North Korean regime operated under the complete control of the Soviet supervisors. Who drafted the above-mentioned land reform law? The Soviet advisers. Who edited and, after some deliberation, confirmed the North Korean Constitution? Stalin himself. Who arrested all the major opponents of the emerging Communist regime? The Soviet military police. Where were they sent to do their time? To prison camps in Siberia, of course!

The available papers leave no doubt that even the relatively mundane actions of the North Korean government needed approval from Moscow. The Soviet Politburo, the supreme council of the state, approved the agenda of the North Korean rubber-stamping parliament and even “gave permission” to stage a parade in 1948. The much-trumpeted conference of the politicians from the North and South in the spring of 1948 was another Soviet idea, even if the leftist historians now love to depict it as yet another expression of Pyongyang’s will to negotiate based on its alleged national feelings. The most important speeches to be delivered by the North Korean leaders had to be pre-read and approved in the Soviet Embassy.

My favorite story in this regard happened in December 1946, when the first elections for the North were being prepared. On Dec. 16, the Soviet Colonel-General Terentii Shtykov discussed the composition of the North Korean proto-parliament with two other Soviet generals. The generals (no Koreans were present) decided that the Assembly would consist of 231 members. They did not forget to distribute the places among the various parties, decided how many women would become members, and the social composition of the legislature. If we have a look at the actual composition of the Assembly, we can see that these instructions were followed with only minor deviations.

Read the full story here:
Southern Biases About North Korea
Korea Times
Andrei Lankov
3/9/2008

Posted in 1946 Land Reform Law, Political economy, Russia | 1 Comment »

Sunday speculation: The end of ‘Songun’?

Sunday, March 9th, 2008

The Daily NK reports that preparations for Kim Jong il’s successor government are ushering in an end to Songun:

North Korea has embarked on a rehabilitation of the Chosun (North Korea) Workers’ Party’s authority, meaning a return to party-centered politics from military-oriented politics, various inside sources suggest. The move could be related Kim Jong Il’s choice of successor.

In late February, a number of sources told the Daily NK through telephone interviews that instructions came down from the Party to each province on February 1st to “pay more respect to the local party apparatus than to the armed forces.”

Various sources said, “The rumours say that the instructions are intended for everyone (resident of Hoeryong)”, “Foreign currency-earning workers were given a mass lecture on this subject in mid-February (resident of Chongjin)”, and “People welcomed the command, hoping for less harassment from the army (resident of Hyesan)”.

Wat is happening in the government?

Last October, Kim Jong Il reappointed his brother-in-law and closest advisor, Jang Sung Taek, to the Director of the Administration Department, which has the responsibility for the National Security Agency, the People’s Safety Agency, and the Prosecutors’ Office. More recently, the Guidance Department undertook a large-scale inspection of the United Front Department, which signals an attempt to strengthen the Party.

The Guidance Department of the Party is the department tasked with leading and inspecting the Party apparatus. It also resides at the core of the North Korean power structure and is under Kim Jong Il’s direct control, so its involvement demonstrates the gravity of this investigation.

Sohn Kwang Ju, the chief editor of Daily NK and an expert on Kim Jong Il, suggested that, “Kim Jong Il, thinking that North Korea has already achieved military strength through the possession of nuclear weapons, is now starting to reconstruct the Party-centered order and revive the Party’s authority.”

Will it work?

Hwang Jang Yop, President of the Committee for the Democratization of North Korea and the former North Korean Foreign Secretary, gave a similar analysis. According to him, “Kim Jong Il, sooner or later, will strengthen the Party’s authority, especially that of the Guidance Department because the Vice-Director position of the Guidance Department should eventually be taken by one of Kim’s sons.”

Nevertheless, many experts expect difficulty for Kim Jong Il in his effort to strengthen the authority of the Party.

Han Ki Hong, the president of the Network for North Korean Democracy and Human Rights, said that “Kim Jong Il has been running his country under the abnormal system of the Military-First policy for over a decade. Throughout that time, the Party’s authority totally collapsed and the armed forces’ power and authority has increased beyond control, and this is irrevocable.”

The full article can be read here:
Possible Shift from the Army to the Party in 10 years
Daily NK
Choi Choel Hee & Lee Sung Jin
3/5/2008

Posted in Political economy, Songun | 4 Comments »

DPRK holds first extended cabinet meeting of the year

Monday, March 3rd, 2008

Institute for Far Eastern Studies (IFES)
NK Brief No. 08-3-3-1
3/3/2008

In the latest issue (February 3rd) of the DPRK Cabinet bulletin, “Democratic Chosun”, it was reported that the first extended cabinet meeting of the year opened in the beginning of February, with Premier Kim Young-il presiding. The bulletin stated that the issue of accomplishing this year’s economic plans was discussed.

At the meeting, Vice Premier Kwak Bum-ki stressed that accomplishing this year’s economic goals was “essential for opening the doors to a breakthrough for building an economically strong nation,” and that it was the “fundamental task laid out before the Cabinet.” He went on to reveal the tasks and directives needed to revitalize all realms of socialist construction, which he stated was necessary to create a powerful and prosperous nation by 2012, the centennial anniversary of the birth of the late Kim Il Sung.

In particular, he called for the production of the “lifeline of socialist construction”, and specifically, electricity, coal, metal, and railways, which he referred to as the “four lines for the advance of the people’s economy.”

Accordingly, the goal of carrying out overwhelming repairs to power generation facilities, and at the same time constructing new power plants in order to increase electrical production capabilities by several hundred thousand kilowatts, was proposed.

The meeting also stressed the need for concentrating efforts on geological exploration and exploitation industries in order to reasonably development and use natural resources, for a change in production of goods necessary for daily life, and for a resolution to the people’s ‘eating problem’ alluded to in the recent New Year’s Joint Editorial.

The bulletin also reported that there was discussion on creating a new five-year plan for the development of science and technology, going as far as to say, ”the role of science and technology in the building of an economically powerful nation is decidedly large, and in order to answer the very real calls for development, [the issue of] strengthening international economic projects” was brought up.

Premier Kim Young-il, Vice-Premier Kwak Bum-ki, Chairman Kim Kwang-rin, of the Committee on National Planning, Park Nam-jil, of the Power Supply Industry Bureau, and Kim Yong-sam, from the Railways Bureau, were among cabinet ministers present.

Posted in 2012 Strong and Prosperous Nation (Kangsong Taeguk), Cabinet, Coal, Domestic publication, Electricity, Energy, Light Industry, Manufacturing, Mining/Minerals, Political economy, Railways, Songun | Comments Closed

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