North Korea has deployed non-manual workers across farms across the country to avert heavy crop losses from the raging drought, state media said on Wednesday (May 4).
The nuclear-armed country, which is under international sanctions for its banned weapons programs, suffers from chronic food shortages.
North Korea is particularly vulnerable to natural disasters, including floods and drought, due to lack of infrastructure, deforestation and decades of state mismanagement.
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Rodong Sinmun
, the official newspaper of North Korea's ruling Workers' Party, claimed on Wednesday that government officials, employees working in businesses and factories
"joined the struggle in drought-stricken regions"
.
“As soon as they arrived, they started watering, working with the farmers in order to fight against nature
,” according to the newspaper.
The article, however, did not specify the extent of the damage suffered so far, but it specifies that these measures aim to limit the consequences of the wave of drought in progress and to
"prevent possible other damage"
.
“Tense” food situation
According to the official KCNA news agency, citing the country's meteorological services, the dry spell is expected to continue throughout the week.
“Light rains”
are
expected on Friday,
“but they will not be helpful in resolving the drought
,” she added.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called for steps to be taken to improve the
"tense"
food situation , caused by the pandemic, typhoons and international sanctions.
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Since the beginning of 2020, North Korea has isolated itself from the rest of the world to protect itself from the pandemic.
It briefly reopened its border with China to freight transport earlier this year.
Pyongyang said it had not registered any cases of Covid-19 on its soil.
North Korea, whose economy and agriculture are in ruins after decades of disastrous management and resources devoted to the nuclear program, suffered a deadly famine in the second half of the 1990s. Hundreds of thousands of people are died then, some estimates point to millions of victims.
