Changchun, China — A recent decree from Chief Secretary of the Yangkang Provincial Committee of the Party Kim Hee Taek stated, \u201cCadres cannot receive food distribution first, while the authorities cannot offer food to the people,\u201d so in theory Yangkang Province officials on municipal and provincial committees have not received any food yet.<\/p>\n
However, a source from Yangkang Province told the Daily NK, \u201cActually, despite the decree, cadres can obtain free potatoes by direct request to farm cadres, and farmers belonging to collective farms can survive by just stealing them, so those who suffer the most from food shortages are city workers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Upon seeing signs that the food situation is becoming serious, factory managers are moving to soothe workers, saying, \u201cGreat amounts of food will come from foreign countries in January, so don\u2019t worry so much.\u201d However, the workers reactions are not ones of great relief, because it is not clear whether that foreign food aid would be distributed to workers even if it did arrive.<\/p>\n
It has been confirmed that the North Korean authorities have been holding lectures on the subject for factories and other enterprises, \u201cWith respect to the latest situation,\u201d since the 7th of this month.<\/p>\n
Daily NK\u2019s source boiled down the contents of the lecture, \u201cThe Americans are on bended knee, begging, \u2018Now, let\u2019s keep close relations with North Korea,\u2019 since their economic sanctions did not work. Our General (Kim Jong Il) will now make those Americans offer rice directly.\u201d <\/p>\n
Last Saturday, at a lecture for cadres entitled, \u201cOur Republic (North Korea)\u2019s firm measures, and prospects for the construction of the strong and prosperous state,\u201d the authorities asserted that, \u201cThe imperialists and opportunist countries (China and Russia) are frightened by our Republic\u2019s determined measures over the Six Party Talks. They are pressing us to have a dialogue with them by bringing presents.\u201d <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, sources claim that the reasons behind the failed harvest this year is due to natural disasters, despite some alternative analyses in previous Daily NK reports. <\/p>\n
Regarding the fertilizer situation, sources explained that it was basically similar to previous years, since, \u201cAlthough there was no South Korean fertilizer, we had no small amounts of Chinese and Russian fertilizer.\u201d<\/p>\n
One source added that, \u201cThe basic reason was uncooperative weather, in July when crops grow at their best the weather was cold, and in June it was dry, and in July and August there was torrential rainfall.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Changchun, China — A recent decree from Chief Secretary of the Yangkang Provincial Committee of the Party Kim Hee Taek stated, \u201cCadres cannot receive food distribution first, while the authorities cannot offer food to the people,\u201d so in theory Yangkang Province officials on municipal and provincial committees have not received any food yet. However, a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":10215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[645],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy"],"yoast_head":"\n