North Korea Faces Food Shortfall

ROME - Mar 28/07 - SNS -- North Korea faces a food shortfall of around one million metric tons (MT) this year and is willing to accept aid, reports the United Nations World Food Program (WFP).

Tony Banbury, WFP Asia Regional Director, based the comment on a March 22 to 27 tour of North Korea and meetings with government officials to review the current WFP operation in the country and the general food security situation.

He traveled for three days in North Phyongan province and visited twelve WFP food delivery sites and projects in Sinuju and Ryongchan cities and Yonju and Tongrim counties.

During meetings with DPRK Government officials in Pyongyang, Banbury raised issues regarding the present food security situation in DPRK, the implementation of the WFP operation, and the future status of WFP food assistance for the country of 23 million people.

Despite steady improvements in the food situation in DPRK after the famine years of the mid- to late 1990s, having enough to eat is still a daily struggle for one-third to one-half of all North Koreans. In 2006, the food situation again started to deteriorate because of June and August flooding of critical cropland and major reductions in WFP and bilateral food assistance.

"We are losing ground in the struggle against hunger in the DPRK," said Banbury. "Last year's harvest was smaller due in part to summer flooding and that, combined with major reductions in international assistance, has left millions of North Koreans more vulnerable to food insecurity. People are going hungry as we head into the lean season. It's time for WFP and the donors to respond."

Distributions under WFP's present operation, which aims to feed up to 1.9 million especially vulnerable North Koreans, are threatened by lack of funding. Donations for the operation, which began last year, amount to less than 20% of the US$102 million required. An immediate increase in funding from donor nations is necessary just to avert further deterioration of food security for the present 700,000 beneficiaries of the WFP operation, while more substantial donations will allow the UN food agency to expand its food assistance from the present 29 counties in which it operates to the 50 counties called for under the WFP aid program in North Korea.

"I am concerned about the well-being of the people we are supposed to be helping but are not able to reach due to lack of resources, and I am concerned about millions more who need our help, who struggle to feed themselves day in and day out," said Banbury. "Increased WFP food assistance would help address the pressing needs of the children and pregnant and nursing women that WFP is trying to help, but only if we get much-needed contributions soon."

WFP's program is designed to build on gains achieved during a decade of emergency assistance. Vitamin and mineral-enriched foods processed at local factories are being given to young children and pregnant and nursing women. Cereal rations are being provided to families through food-for-community-development projects aimed at reclaiming cropland and rehabilitating local agricultural infrastructure.

Past WFP operations delivered more than four million tons of food valued at US$1.7 billion and supported up to one-third of the North Korean population, contributing to a significant reduction in malnutrition rates over a decade beginning in 1995. Still, the most recent large-scale nutrition survey conducted by WFP, UNICEF and the government in October, 2004, found 37% of young children to be chronically malnourished and one-third of mothers both malnourished and anaemic.

Donors to WFP's operation in DPRK to date include Russian Federation (US$5 million), Switzerland (US$2.5 million), Multilateral funds (US$1.8 million), Cuba (US$1.7 million), Australia (US$1.2 million), Denmark (US$883,000), Luxembourg (US$703,555), Germany (US$658,761), Ireland (US$636,943), and Italy (US$51,928).