The effects of catastrophic droughts wreaking havoc on North Korea last year are still persisting unchecked, the most severe of which continues to be power outages crippling the nation. 

��On January 1st they only provided exactly one hour of electricity during Kim Jong Eun��s New Year��s Address, and that after that there was no power for the rest of the day,�� a source in Yangkang Province reported to Daily NK on January 6th. 

In the past, North Korea generally provided increased allotments of electricity to every household throughout the country to ensure viewing of the ��Supreme Leader��s�� New Year��s Address, which lays out major policy points and prescriptions for the year. 

However, contrary to the past, this year��s provision of merely an hour is highly unusual-- indicative of moribund power supplies and an escalating degree of severity that lacks the infrastructure and resources for a viable solution. The peak of the drought saw outages so severe that the Pyongyang-Hyesan rail reduced to stop-and-go status, with trains taking days longer than usual to arrive at their final destination, if ever at all.

Not only that, suspended or intermittent service from the nation's hydroelectric power plants has affected coal production, thus, thermal plant operations dependent on the resource are failing to operate properly as well. As previously reported by Daily NK, these issues brought operations at the largest iron ore-producer in North Korea, Musan Mine, to a halt in November.

Despite these conditions, the source asserted that the short provisions of electricity-- on an occasion generally deemed of great importance--diminished overall meaning associated with the day for residents. ��Because there was no electricity on New Year��s this year it didn��t feel like a holiday at all,�� she explained, adding that many residents remarked, "'I guess the New Year��s Address wasn��t that important this year, huh? The value of the whole thing just dropped.'"