South Pyongan Province is calling on rural residents to contribute rice to help food-poor families in the province’s urban areas, Daily NK has learned.
“The party committee of South Pyongan Province held a meeting on the poor food situation in the province on June 8,” a source in South Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons. “It ordered farms in Pyongwon County, Sukchon County and Mundok County to take the lead in a 10-day campaign to donate rice to support food-poor families in cities who are struggling due to the desperate food situation.”
In the order, the party committee appealed to rural communities to take the lead in sending food to urban residents who are struggling, emphasizing that urban residents actively help out rural communities in their times of need.
The party committee explained that national construction of rural housing currently underway “didn’t just fall from the sky, but was the result of the Workers’ Party’s love of farmers,” and that “rural residents must show at least a little gratitude by helping in difficult times.”
According to the source, there are “lots of food-poor families even in urban areas today, so the party committee saiod that farms and farm workers must help in times like this, and that officials on farm management committees must encourage farmers by taking the lead in propaganda and agitation activities.”
County-level farms are responding to the party committee’s plea by demanding that over the course of the 10-day campaign “everyone must provide at least a handful or kilogram of rice as a show of thanks for living in nice houses built by labor brigades made up of urban residents.”
“Farmers are complaining that they have no choice but to provide rice because the party asked for it,” the source said. “Since farmers are also suffering from food shortages, farm managers are calling on them to tough it out, even if it’ll be difficult until a fresh crop is harvested in June.”
Meanwhile, farm managers continue to emphasize to farmers that they must produce more grain this year than in years past, the source said.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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