North Korea recently suspended classes for elementary school students in certain regions of the country to mobilize them for rice planting, leading to complaints from their parents, Daily NK has learned.
“Kaechon declared May 10 to May 31 a general mobilization period for rice planting and mobilized everyone in the city to engage in farmwork,” a Daily NK source in South Pyongan Province said Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons. “Students took part in the mobilization, with the classes being suspended from May 20 to May 31.”
According to the source, students helped plant rice from 2 PM to 8 PM, after their classes had ended for the day. From May 20, however, their classes were suspended entirely, and they had to spend all day in the fields.
For years, North Korean authorities have mobilized young students to help plant rice under the slogan that “everyone who eats rice must help out.” However, parents have grown increasingly upset at how their children are forced into the fields to do work even adults find difficult.
This is not the first time the authorities have suspended classes for students, either. The authorities justify the measure by saying, “We can fight against the enemy and win only if there’s a lot of food.” However, some people are quietly criticizing the government’s violation of their children’s right to access education, saying that the nation’s people “need to fight and win by using their brains.”
Some students get out of mobilizations through bribes
Broadly speaking, North Korea’s education system is heavily discriminatory towards those without money to spare. This year, as in the past, the children of the country’s wealthy entrepreneurial class, or donjuLiterally "masters of money," donju refers to people who hav... More, and the offspring of cadres often got out of the rice planting campaign by slipping their teachers money, the source said.
“Poor students were all mobilized to the fields because they would be treated as ideologically problematic if they missed even a single day.”
Students who took part in the rice planting mobilizations even had to prepare boxed lunches every day.
“The problem is that there are many poor families that substitute watery gruel for meals because they can’t even put a single meal on the table,” the source said. “Given these circumstances, parents who have to prepare boxed lunches for their children every day have no choice but to complain.”
Despite this situation, North Korean authorities continue to adhere to “principles.”
“If students miss even a single day of mobilizations due to life circumstances or health reasons, [the authorities] convene an ideological struggle session and shame them with intensive criticism,” the source said. “Rather than being focused [on political ideology], I think the government’s duty is to first fill their people’s bellies before putting them to work, even if the food is just maize mixed with rice.”
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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