South Hwanghae Province, North Korea’s main grain-producing region, is facing a severe power shortage, Daily NK has learned.
“The residents of rural counties such as Anak and Eunyul are facing particularly serious power shortages,” a source in South Hwanghae Province told Daily NK last Thursday on condition of anonymity. “Electricity for agricultural water circulation is supplied for four hours a day, but electricity for daily use is supplied for less than one hour a day.”
While residents of urban areas are coping with the power shortage by using generators and car batteries, residents of smaller villages do not have access to even these options.
As a result, residents of Daechu and Wonryong villages in Anak County rely heavily on solar power.
In one neighborhood, the source said that almost all but three or four households have solar panels.
But with the worsening power shortage, solar panels are often stolen while people are out working.
“Theft is on the rise as living conditions deteriorate,” the source said. “People are stealing anything that might be worth some money in the blink of an eye, and solar panels are no exception.”
Villagers work in the fields all day, and thieves break into empty houses and steal everything while people are at work.
Some people have resorted to locking their solar panels inside their homes while they are at work, because if their solar panels are stolen, they will have to live in pitch darkness in the evenings.
“When we come home after work, it’s usually between 8 and 9 PM, so if we don’t have electric light, we have to live like blind people. Besides, we don’t even have a good supply of tap water at home, so we can’t even wash ourselves properly after working hard all day,” the source said. “Our quality of life is really subhuman at the moment.
“This year’s electricity shortage seems to be even more severe than last year’s,” the source said. “One of the advantages of living in the countryside was that we could use a lot of electricity during the busy farming season, but that is no longer the case.
“Rural people all dream of living in a world where they can eat to their heart’s content, even if the meal is corn rice instead of rice with meat stew, and have a stable power and water supply,” the source said. “I hope the government can find out what the people desperately need as soon as possible and come up with solutions that can help make our dreams come true.”
Translated by Annie Eun Jung Kim. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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