North Korean police and state security officers in Pyongsong, South Pyongan Province, recently received a year’s worth of food rations. Amid government propaganda about a rare bumper harvest last year, the officers had hoped to receive more rations than usual, only to be disappointed by an unexpectedly meager haul.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a source in South Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Monday about the rations received by police officers in Pyongsong in early January. A policeman with a wife and a son received annual rations of 50 kilograms of rice and 200 kilograms of husked corn (about 140 kilograms of edible kernels remain after the corn is husked).
In North Korea, rice is considered equivalent to twice the weight of corn. Under this conversion rate, a family of three essentially receives 240 kilograms of corn as a year’s ration.
Police officers in the North Korean Ministry of Social Security and officers in the Ministry of State Security typically receive annual rations of 200 kilograms of grain per person. Including family members’ rations, this police officer should have received at least 500 kilograms of grain, but he received less than half that amount.
The family in question had received 300 kilograms of maize as their annual ration in early 2023. Food prices were exceptionally high at the time because the 2022 harvest had been disrupted by national disasters, including flooding and a typhoon, and because grain imports were low due to COVID-19 restrictions. Still, the family received 60 kilograms more in food rations last year than this year.
A public security officer in Pyongsong, also with a family of three, received 30 kilograms of rice and 200 kilograms of rice in the husk as annual rations.
The reason that state security officers received less than police officers is because the police have more influence in the interior than along the border and can claim more grain.
The North Korean authorities had repeatedly boasted that last year’s harvest was “a bumper crop of unprecedented proportions,” and during the year-end plenary session they also touted “grain production exceeding the quota” as “the most precious and valuable goal achieved in our economic projects in 2023.”
So, officials who were looking forward to more rations this year than last were greatly disappointed by the small amount they received, the source said.
“Many people were stunned by the meager size of the rations. Despite the supposedly bountiful harvest, rice prices on the market are stubbornly high and people are already talking about a grain shortage,” the source said.
In September 2023, a kilogram of rice on North Korean markets had shot up to KPW 6,600 before dropping to KPW 4,700 in early December, after the rice harvest was over. Since late December, however, prices have shown signs of increasing. In markets in Hyesan, Yanggang Province, a kilogram of rice has been selling for more than KPW 5,000 since late December.
Meanwhile, employees of the Pyongsong prosecutors’ office have still not received their annual rations. There’s not enough food to give the staff their annual rations all at once, so their rations are likely to be distributed in installments at a later date, the source explained.
Translated by David Carruth. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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