United Nations: North Korea Facing Serious Food Shortages

Cultivating a field in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Photo: FAO

DW: UN FAO reports drop in North Korea food production

North Korea's food production has fallen, the UN reports. The Food and Agriculture Organization warns that it expects worsening hunger as the country continues to receive below-average rainfall.

In 2015, North Korea produced about 5.4 million tons of food, including cereals, soybeans and potatoes, down from the 5.9 million tons it produced in 2014, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. That is the first drop since 2010, the FAO announced in a report released late Wednesday, and the trend shows no sign of reversing.

"Given the tight food supplies in 2015-16, the country's food security situation is expected to deteriorate from the previous year, when most households were already estimated to have poor or borderline food-consumption levels," the FAO announced.

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More News On North Korea Facing Serious Food Shortages

Water scarcity in DPR Korea causes first drop in food production since 2010 – UN agency -- UN News Centre
United Nations: North Korea food crisis worsening -- AP
N. Korea food production falls for first time since 2010, hunger worsening - UN -- Reuters
Drought-hit North Korea 'facing food security threat' -- IBTimes
North Korea Food Supply Imperiled by Drought, UN Says -- Bloomberg
N. Korea's food shortage worst in four years, says UN -- Korea Times

North Korea Tells Its Citizens To Be Ready For A New Famine

The Telegraph: North Koreans told to prepare for new 'arduous march'

In an ominous echo of famine in the 1990s, the sanctions-hit regime is telling citizens to be ready to 'chew the roots of plants once again'.

In a proclamation that will strike fear into the hearts of the North Korean people, state media has ordered the citizenry to prepare for a new "arduous march".

The term was first coined by the North Korean leadership in 1993 as a metaphor for the four-year famine that decimated the nation from 1994.

The famine - in which as many as 3.5 million of the nation's 22 million people died - was brought on by economic mismanagement, natural disasters, the collapse of the Soviet bloc and the consequent loss of aid, combined with the regime's insistence on continuing a life of luxury and feeding the military.

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More News On North Korea Telling Its Citizens To Be Ready For A New Famine

North Korea Tells Citizens to Prepare Themselves for Famine -- Time
N.Korea Prepares for Hard Times Amid Sanctions -- Chosun Ilbo
North Korea warns of famine as Kim Jong Un visits upscale store -- UPI
North Korea tells citizens to 'prepare themselves for famine' -- The Independent
North Koreans warned to prepare for 'arduous march' - metaphor for devastating famine -- Independent.ie
Reports: North Korea Warns of New 'Arduous March' -- VOA
North Korea Warns Citizens of Approaching Famine -- Sputnik
North Korea warns of another “Arduous March” -- NK News

Many North Koreans Facing Starvation

North Koreans distribute imported sacks of flour on the banks of Yalu River, near the North Korean town of Sinuiju, opposite the Chinese border city of Dandong

Voice of America: FAO: N. Korea Food Distribution Dangerously Low

Food distribution in North Korea has dropped to dangerous levels, according to a United Nation's food agency.

The country is distributing an average of 250 grams of daily food rations per person, a 21 percent decline from a three-year average, the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said Monday.

The figure is less than half of the minimum amount recommended by the United Nations.

North Korea has been cutting food distribution since early July when it reduced the daily food rations to 310 grams per person. Later, the amount was reduced to the current level.

Update: North Korea reduced its food rations again in July, says FAO -- UPI

WNU Editor: But they have enough and resources to spend on nuclear weapons and rockets .... sighhh .... such is North Korea.

North Korea Facing Food Shortages (Again)

North Koreans work on a rice field during the harvest outside the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. © 2005 Reuters

Washington Post: Dry winter sparks fears of another food crisis in North Korea

SEOUL — As North Korea heads toward the “barley hump” — the lean season before the rice and corn harvest in the summer — aid agencies are warning that an unusually dry winter is compounding chronic food shortages in the impoverished country.

And while North Korea may no longer be in a state of famine, malnutrition remains such a widespread problem that even slight changes in weather can have an outsized impact on ordinary people’s food supply.

WNU Editor: Every country that has run their agribusiness on the principles of a collective farm have failed .... and sadly for the people of North Korea .... they are probably the last country in the world that is trying to make such a corrupt and insanely stupid system to work.

Reports Of Famine And Cannabilism In North Korea

North Koreans observe a moment of silence at Mansudae in Pyongyang, on the first anniversary of Kim Jong Il's death on Dec. 17. Kyodo/ Reuters

North Korean Parents 'Eating Their Own Children' After Being Driven Mad By Hunger In Famine-Hit Pariah State -- Daily Mail

* Undercover reporters found a 'shocking' number of cannibalism incidents
* Up to 10,000 people feared dead after 'hidden famine' in farming provinces
* Drought and confiscated food contribute to desperate shortage, reports say
* Reports of men digging up corpses for food and murdering children

A starving man in North Korea has been executed after murdering his two children for food, reports from inside the secretive state claim.

A 'hidden famine' in the farming provinces of North and South Hwanghae is believed to have killed up to 10,000 people and there are fears that incidents of cannibalism have risen.

The grim story is just one to emerge as residents battle starvation after a drought hit farms and shortages were compounded by party officials confiscating food.

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More News On Reports Of Cannibalism In North Korea

‘Cannibalism’ reports in famine-hit North Korea -- Scotsman
'Starving North Koreans eating own kids, corpses' -- Times of India
North Koreans turn to cannibalism to survive, including their own children -- Examiner
During Famine Last Year, North Korean Resorted to Cannibalism -- Epoch Times
North Korean parents eat their children as famine worsens -- Digital Journal

Has Famine Returned To North Korea?

North Korea's New, Man-Made Famine -- Todd Crowell, Real Clear World

TOKYO – Recent foreign visitors to Pyongyang are often impressed by the new construction that seems to be sprouting up everywhere in North Korea’s drab capital. New high-rise apartment buildings have been erected, department stores and theaters refurbished and even amusement parks and theme parks opened.

“Ever since Kim Jong-un assumed the position of supreme leader, the media in North Korea and visiting foreigners have reported on the beautifully developing capital, Pyongyang. But in the shadow of the ‘gorgeous’ capital a hidden famine has broken out,” says Jiro Ishimaru, chief editor of Asiapress in Osaka, a North Korean watchdog with numerous clandestine reporters throughout North Korea.

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My Comment: My friends and contacts in South Korea have been saying the same thing to me since November of last year .... a state of famine now exists in certain parts of North Korea.

Growing Food Emergency In North Korea

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un (2nd right) with Wang Jiarui (2nd left), head of the International Liaison Department of China's Communist Party, and other Chinese officials in Pyongyang Photo: Reuters

North Koreans In Desperate Need Of Food After Floods -- CNN

(CNN) -- The World Food Programme said Friday it is stepping in to feed people in North Korea, where floods have ruined crops and left nearly 63,000 homeless, according to reports.

The United Nations declared the situation in North Korea an emergency Thursday after torrential rain soaked the country between July 18 and 29. Eighty-eight people have died, a U.N. report said, though national media put the toll at more than 100.

Counties most affected by the floods are in need of immediate food assistance, the report said.

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Update #1: UN: NKorea needs immediate food aid due to flood -- AP
Update #2: Kim Jong-un holds first top-level diplomatic meeting as North Korea seeks food aid -- The Telegraph

My Comment: Another food emergency in North Korea .... tell me something that is not new. The problem with providing aid to North Korea is that those who need it never get it .... and those who do get it are the ones who could infleunce and change the system .... but because they are being fed by this aid .... lose any motivation to press for change.

Reports Of Famine In North Korea's 'Rice Bowl'

Why People In N.Korea's 'Rice Bowl' Are Starving -- Chosun Ilbo

Thousands of people are starving to death in North Korea's South Hwanghae Province even though it is the country's rice bowl, according to a defector.

"Villages in remote mountains can resort to slash-and-burn farming to survive, but in lowland areas where there are only cooperative farms, 30 to 40 people in each village starve to death every year," said Choi Myong-chol (not his real name), who used to handle crop harvests in Haeju, South Hwanghae Province. "The reason is that their entire harvest is confiscated," he told the activist website NK Reform.

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My Comment: If they are reporting 20,000 dead .... that tells me that millions are suffering.

UN Report: Hunger Widespread In North Korea

A giant bronze statue of the late Kim Il-sung, founder of North Korea, in Pyongyang Photo: GETTY

Millions Of Children Going 'Without Food And Healthcare' In North Korea, UN Warns -- Daily Mail

Millions of North Korean children are not getting the food, medicine or healthcare they need to develop physically or mentally, leaving many stunted and malnourished, the United Nations said today.

Nearly a third of children under the age of five show signs of stunting, particularly in rural areas where food is scarce, and chronic diarrhoea due to a lack of clean water, sanitation and electricity has become the leading cause of death among children, the agency said.

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More News On Widespread Hunger In North Korea

Millions of North Korean children don’t get essential food, health care, UN report says -- Washington Post/AP
Children of North Korea are ‘stunted and malnourished’ -- Scotsman
U.N. optimistic on U.S. aid for North Korea, food still a problem -- Reuters
Food shortage for 16m North Koreans -- News.com.au

North Koreans Getting Ready To Starve

(Click on Image to Enlarge)

Get Ready To Starve -- Foreign Policy

The West was just gearing up to send food to a hungry North Korea. Then came the death of Kim Jong Il.

It is extremely hard to know what North Koreans are really feeling as they mourn the death of Kim Jong Il today. What's clear, though, is that there is plenty to be anxious about. It's not just that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea faces a prolonged period of uncertainty as the Dear Leader's putative political heir, the 27-year-old Kim Jong Un, settles into his new job. There's also the not inconsequential matter of getting enough to eat as North Korea's infamously hard and barren winter approaches.

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My Comment: Even sending food aid to North Korea would be a waste .... the aid would only be re-directed to the military and political cadres who have perpetuated this holocaust since the early 1990s.

Famine Returning To North Korea

A North Korean woman prepares a meal in her house at the Soksa-Ri collective farm in an area damaged by summer floods and typhoons in South Hwanghae province, Sept. 29. Damir Sagolj/Reuters

Hunger Crisis Grips North Korea As Food Runs Short -- MSNBC/Reuters

U.S. and South Korea won't resume aid unless communist regime meets certain conditions.

HAEJU, North Korea — In a pediatric hospital in North Korea's most productive farming province, children lay two to a bed. All showed signs of severe malnutrition: skin infections, patchy hair, listless apathy.

"Their mothers have to bring them here on bicycles," said duty doctor Jang Kum Son in the Yellow Sea port city of Haeju. "We used to have an ambulance but it's completely broken down. One mother traveled 72 kilometers (45 miles). By the time they get here, it's often too late."

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My Comment: And winter has not even started yet .... this is going to be a disaster by January/February next year and there is nothing that we can do about it as long as the regime in Pyongyang stays in power..

Why Donors Are Reluctant To Give Aid To North Korea

U.S. Army Col. Kurt Taylor, center, briefs U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, right, in Panmunjom, the demilitarized zone that has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, north of Seoul, South Korea, July 21, 2010. DoD photo by Cherie Cullen

Starving North Korea Faces Suspicious Donors -- L.A. Times

Humanitarian groups warn that about 6 million North Koreans face severe food shortages but international donors say they want better oversight before giving more, alleging that most aid is diverted by the regime.

As humanitarian groups warn of increasing food shortages in North Korea, the authoritarian government faces diminishing prospects for international aid, with allegations from both the United States and South Korea that donations rarely reach the poor and starving.

The European Union recently announced a plan to provide $14.5 million in emergency aid to the impoverished nation of 24 million as officials expressed concern at food shortages caused by seasonal flooding and a severe winter.

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My Comment: When it comes to North Korea .... one should never trust what they say and they want to do. After (God knows how many) famines and massive food shortages .... fortunately .... aid agencies are beginning to wise up to this game. Unfortunately for the North Koreans, this is probably going to be a rough winter for most of them.

Starving Plight Of N Koreans Revealed

Photo: Many of the orphaned children's parents were victims of starvation or the gulags (ABC TV)

N Korean Children Begging, Army Starving: Exclusive -- ABC News (Australia)

Footage shot inside North Korea and obtained by the ABC has revealed the extent of chronic food shortages and malnutrition inside the secretive state.

The video is some of the most revealing footage ever smuggled out of the impoverished North Korean state.

Shot over several months by an undercover North Korean journalist, the harrowing footage shows images of filthy, homeless and orphaned children begging for food and soldiers demanding bribes.

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My Comment: I have seen worse footage of life in North Korea than this one, but this is the first time that I hear North Korean soldiers talking about food shortages.

North Korea Facing Another Famine

North Korean soldiers unload sacks of rice from a freight boat on the banks of Yalu River near the North Korean town of Sinuiju, opposite the Chinese border city of Dandong. Photograph by: Stringer, Reuters

U.N.: North Korea Faces Critical Food Shortage -- Wall Street Journal

SEOUL—North Korea's government food distribution system will run dry in May and put one-quarter of the country's 24 million residents at risk of starvation, the U.N. World Food Program said in an assessment that may influence whether the U.S. and other countries provide assistance to the country.

The agency said North Korea's chronically undernourished people are facing a tougher-than-usual springtime due to the effects on crops of flooding last year and extreme cold this winter. An outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease since December also damaged livestock production.

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More News On North Korea`s Food Crisis

North Korea's food stocks running dry, UN warns -- The Telegraph
Over 6 million people need food aid in North Korea - U.N. -- Reuters
UN: 6 million North Koreans need food aid -- AP
The food crisis in the North -- Joong Ang Daily
UN says 6 million North Koreans are in urgent need of international food assistance -- Canadian Press/AP

My Comment: Our lawmakers should be concerned .... unfortunately .... receiving food (or not) will not impact the North Korean regime.

North Korea Is Starving

Starving N. Korea Begs For Food, But U.S. Has Concerns About Resuming Aid -- Washington Post

TOKYO - North Korea recently took the unusual step of begging for food handouts from the foreign governments it usually threatens.

Plagued by floods, an outbreak of a livestock disease and a brutal winter, the government ordered its embassies and diplomatic offices around the world to seek help.

The request has put the United States and other Western countries in the uncomfortable position of having to decide whether to ignore the pleas of a starving country or pump food into a corrupt distribution system that often gives food to those who need it least.

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My Comment: What is the point of giving food aid .... it will only be directed to the military and North Korea's ruling apparatus. My prediction .... food aid will still be shipped to North Korea with the hope that some of it will be directed to the hungry. Sadly .... I know through my Korean contacts that this will probably not happen.

Famine ReturnsTo North Korea

Kim Jong-Il with an entourage

Starving North Korea Sends Out SOS For food Aid -- The Telegraph

North Korea is begging friends and foes alike for food aid while the elite of the regime prepares to celebrate the 69th birthday of Kim Jong-Il on February 16th.

The requests for assistance began last autumn, the South Korean newspaper the JoongAng Daily reported, but have become "frantic" in the last two months.

"Since the end of last year, North Korea has been asking the US, international organisations and almost every country it has diplomatic ties with, including nations in Europe and Southeast Asia, to assist it with food," the paper quoted a unidentified source as saying.

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My Comment: The sad part is that little if any of this food aid will end up in the hands of those who are hungry.

Laying The Groundwork For The Next North Korean Famine

Welfare Group Claims North Korea Has Halted Food Rations To Citizens -- Voice of America

A South Korean welfare group with contacts in North Korea says the government there has totally stopped supplying food rations to its citizens.

A Buddhist welfare organization says promised Chinese aid of grain to North Korea has not arrived, and that has compelled Pyongyang to authorize people to buy food in private markets, which now operate around the clock.

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More News On The Food Shortage In North Korea

N.Korea completely cuts off state rations: aid group -- AFP
S.Korea's Lee vows to stick to stern North Korea policy -- AFP
'EU should not halt food aid to North Korea' -- Korea Times
Views Show How North Korea Policy Spread Misery -- New York Times
Hidden misery: a glimpse into North Korea -- Toronto Star
Doctor Tackles TB In North Korea -- NPR
Will Humanitarian Aid Be a Casualty in North Korea? -- Take Part

My Comment: Sinking a South Korea naval vessel may soon be the least of North Korea's problems.

Hunger Comes To North Korea (Again)

North Korean farmers work in their fields outside the North Korean capital of Pyongyang, February 25, 2008. Mark Ralston / AFP / Getty

Dispute Stalls U.S. Food Aid To N. Korea -- Washington Post

A Third of Population Needs Help, U.N. Says

TOKYO, Dec. 8 -- A much-heralded U.S. program to restart food aid to North Korea has run into difficulty as Washington and Pyongyang haggle over the terms of access, according to U.S. and overseas officials. The previously undisclosed problems come amid estimates of growing hunger in the isolated communist country.

A report released Monday by the U.N. World Food Program and Food and Agriculture Organization said that despite a better-than-usual harvest, more than a third of North Korea's population will need food aid in the coming year. The agencies' estimate of the number of hungry has jumped from 6.2 million to 8.7 million.

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My Comment: This was predicted in a Time Magazine piece early this year. You can ship tons and tons of food to North Korea, but the North Korean Government will only use this aid to feed its allies and punish its enemies.

When Will North Korea Collapse?

Farmers in North Korea near Panmunjom Tuesday. On weekends, city dwellers are sent to help farms where the machinery no longer works.

From Real Clear Politics:

An array of intelligence analysts, Asian and American scholars, specialists in think tanks, and workers in relief organizations have renewed speculation that the North Korean regime of Kim Jong Il is in danger of collapsing because that nation is on the brink of mass starvation and mounting isolation.

No one will even guess when this might happen-within a year, more likely within five years, and almost surely within ten years? Will the collapse be a "soft landing" in which Kim's regime gradually falls apart with the pieces picked up by the South Koreans, or will it be a "hard landing" in which Kim's regime implodes and chaos sweeps the land?

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More News On North Korea

North Korea Denuclearization Talks on Hold -- Epoch Times
U.S.- Korean nuclear envoys fail to meet -- UPI
Still on the Terror List -- Wall Street Journal
U.S.- Korean Nuclear Envoys Fail To Meet -- Official Wire
South Korea, U.S. start military drills, irking North -- Reuters
PRESS DIGEST - South Korean newspapers - Aug 18 -- Reuters

My Comment: The North Korean Government is not going to fall apart tomorrow. But the people are starving .... come this winter they will be dying.