Stephan Haggard On How N. Koreans Cope With Food Shortages
Going hungry in North Korea
07/28/2011
Jean Lee,
The South China Morning Post
It's an unlikely sight: hundreds of ostriches, a bird native to sunny Africa, squatting and squabbling in the morning chill on a sprawling farm in North Korea. Even stranger: in winter, some wear quilted vests.
Built on the heels of a 1990s famine, the ostrich farm was a bold, expensive investment that the state hoped would help feed its people and provide goods to export. Years later, ostrich meat is the speciality at some of Pyongyang's finest restaurants, but it appears out of reach of millions of hungry North Koreans.
The showcase farm is an idiosyncratic approach to one of the biggest issues confronting North Korea: food.
North Korea's food shortage has reached a crisis point this year, aid workers say, largely because of shocks to the agricultural sector, including torrential rain and the coldest winter in 60 years. Six million North Koreans were living on a knife-edge and would go hungry without immediate food aid, the World Food Programme (WFP) said in April, when it called for US$224 million in emergency aid.
North Korean officials made quiet pleas for help, citing rising global food prices, shortfalls in fertiliser and the winter freeze that killed their wheat harvest. In return, they agreed to strict monitoring conditions - a rare concession.
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Stephan Haggard can provide commentary on current developments in the Asia-Pacific, including particularly Korea, and on the politics of economic reform and globalization.
Visit Stephan Haggard and Marcus Noland's Blog on North Korea.
