Despite three years having passed still North Korea began operating state-run food shops, many North Koreans barely recognize they are there because the shops are typically short of stock.
North Korea established state-run food shops nationwide after the Eighth Party Congress in January 2021 with a view to restrict and control the price and distribution of food, providing grain at prices 20 to 30% lower than market prices. The goal was to restore the socialist planned economy through state control over the sale of grains like rice and corn.
According to multiple Daily NK reporting partners in North Korea recently, North Korea currently operates 286 food shops nationwide. They say this number appears in an internal document that was created based on a survey by the Cabinet’s Agricultural Commission.
In South Pyongan Province’s Pyongsong, each of the city’s 21 neighborhoods, or dong, has a grain shop. Administratively, there are 13 villages, or ri, in Pyongsong as well, but given that ri are rural communities, no state-run food shops exist in these localities because it is up to farms to distribute grain to local residents.
Apart from the food shops, North Korea also operates food distribution centers to provide food rations to government cadres. The authorities operate 10 food distribution centers in Pyongsong, including centers for the provincial party committee, city party committee, provincial and city branches of the Ministry of Social Security and Ministry of State Security, along with school teachers.
Daily NK understands that when North Korea conducted trial operations of grain shops in 2021, not only did the shops have woefully insufficient grain to provide to residents, but they also sold items other than grain such as sugar and seasonings to inflate their sales numbers.
Recently, however, the shops sell mostly grain, such as rice and corn.
Last month, one shop in Pyongsong was selling rice, corn, whole wheat and wheat flour, with the latter two imported from Russia, one reporting partner told Daily NK.
The grain shops sell unhusked rice and polished rice separately, even if they are the same breed of rice. They also sell peeled corn kernels and whole corn on the cob separately at different prices.
In northern regions such as Yanggang Province, Chagang Province and the two Hamgyong provinces, food shops also sell regional specialties such as potatoes, soybeans and red beans, the reporting partner said.
Depending on the food supply situation, in regions with lots of oak trees, the shops sell acorn noodles made from eight parts of acorn powder and two parts of wheat, and in regions where kudzu grows, they sell kudzu noodles made from kudzu and corn powder.
However, the food shops are typically unable to secure enough grain to distribute it to the public in regular intervals due to the country’s poor agricultural situation, and despite active efforts by the government to buy grains from farmers.
“What they sell in the shops is cheaper than in markets, but the quality isn’t good, and you can only buy small amounts, so the shops don’t really help,” one of the reporting partners told Daily NK.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Daily NK works with a network of reporting partners who live inside North Korea and China. Their identities remain anonymous due to security concerns. More information about Daily NK’s reporting partner network and information gathering activities can be found on our FAQ page here.
Please direct any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.
