North Korea food shortage turns into new Asia humanitarian crisis
Regime clamps down on hoarding as rationing system on verge of collapse SEOUL -- North Korea's food shortages have reached crisis levels, and inequalities have sharply widened ever since the COVID-19 pandemic forced the country to close its borders in January last year.
The reclusive nation will be short by about 860,000 tons of food this year, or about two months of normal demand, the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization estimated in a recent report.
The government has been trying to get the population to supply their own food but with little success. News agencies with sources inside the country are reporting starvation deaths as well as an increase in the number of children and elderly who have resorted to begging.
Jiro Ishimaru of AsiaPress said North Korea's current food shortage is quickly shaping up to be the worst humanitarian crisis in Asia. In a column earlier this month, he said it was "frustrating that the reality of the situation has not been conveyed to the world."
The country's food rationing system also seems to have collapsed, with many regions receiving little or no supplies for months on end. According to Daily NK, authorities in North Hamgyong Province recently released food reserves after rice prices rose sharply, but local sources said the system for distributing rations has changed. Families are now receiving "food tickets" from local community organizations that can get them "eight parts corn and two parts unglutinous rice -- all depending, of course, on the size of the family," according to the source.Gianluca Spezza, an associate research fellow at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Stockholm, said the current food situation in North Korea is "very bad.""The DPRK was hanging by a thread before COVID -- it has one patron, and one buyer, China -- and that thread just got worn out now, due to sanctions, COVID, and prolonged [border] closure," he said. With international organizations no longer able to operate within the country, Spezza said "there is no reason to think that things may have magically improved with isolation."But it is not just the food situation that has worsened. The human security aspect of this problem also deserves attention, according to Greg Scarlatoiu, executive director of the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea (HRNK). "Due to travel restrictions and border closures imposed under the pretext of COVID-19 prevention, the human security of North Koreans is even more dire than it was during the pre-COVID period."
