The poor potato harvest in Yanggang Province has left many retirees without government distributions of potatoes, Daily NK has learned.
“While potato handouts began in Hyesan on Oct. 10, none of the rations are going to the families of pensioners,” a source in Yanggang Province told Daily NK on Tuesday.
Traditionally, local district offices in the province have given potato rations to pensioners’ families every fall. Each family received an average of 200-300 kilograms of potatoes, though they tended to be smaller than those allocated for distribution at workplaces or those on sale in local markets.
The amount of potatoes distributed to retirees has gradually decreased as the potato crop has shrunk each year. Last year, families received just 70 kilograms of potatoes. This year, the potato distributions to retirees have stopped altogether, the source said.
NO MORE POTATOES
Potato rations are extremely important for residents of Yanggang Province. When families run out of grain, they can still use potatoes to prepare noodles or cakes. For that reason, pensioners’ families really look forward to the potato rations in the fall, the source said.
But since retirees’ families haven’t received their potato rations this year, they are already struggling to stay fed, he added.
As rumors spread that next year’s harvest will be unusually lean, concerns are being raised in the general public about next year’s food situation, with many wondering how they will make it through another year.
“Even two years ago, pensioners’ families had various gripes about the potato rations — that the potatoes were too small, that there weren’t enough, and so on. But this year, just as the economy has even worse, they’re horrified that they haven’t gotten any potatoes at all,” the source said.
“When potatoes were distributed normally, people would sometimes sell potatoes in the markets, but hardly anyone is doing that this year. In fact, there are more buyers than sellers of potatoes, which is keeping the price of potatoes from falling even at harvest time,” he added.
At the moment, potatoes are reportedly trading for KPW 1,500-2,000 per kilogram at markets in Hyesan. At this time last year, the highest price for one kilogram of potatoes was KPW 1,700, but it is now KPW 300 higher this year, at KPW 2,000. Given the meager harvest of potatoes this year, the price will probably rise even further in coming days, the source predicted.
The people who suffer the most in such a situation are pensioners’ families, since they are not economically active, the source said.
“The retirees’ families who didn’t receive any potato rations will probably face an even worse food shortage this winter. We’ll see a large number collapse or die from hunger,” he predicted.
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