{"id":62039,"date":"2024-12-05T15:30:33","date_gmt":"2024-12-05T06:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.dailynk.com\/english\/?p=62039"},"modified":"2026-04-06T14:11:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T05:11:43","slug":"north-korean-state-shops-near-china-allow-food-purchases-foreign-currency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dailynk.com\/english\/north-korean-state-shops-near-china-allow-food-purchases-foreign-currency\/","title":{"rendered":"N. Korean state shops near China allow food purchases in foreign currency"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">North Korean state-run grain shops near the Chinese border have begun accepting foreign currency for food purchases, despite official restrictions on foreign currency use.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This policy has sparked discontent among locals, as the government simultaneously cracks down on foreign currency use by the general public, according to a source in North Hamgyong province recently.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some grain shops intermittently accepted foreign currency from the public before, but recently, they have shown a much stronger preference for foreign currency than local money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">North Korean authorities ban the public from using foreign currency, slapping criminal punishments on people caught using it. Therefore, people are highly displeased that state-run grain shops accept foreign currency.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cJust a few days ago in Hoeryong, the police arrested a money changer and a person who was changing foreign currency into local money and sent them to a forced labor camp,\u201d the source said. \u201cThe money was confiscated, and the people got to spend time in a forced labor camp.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In markets, businesspeople have often had to bribe enforcement personnel to get their cash back after getting caught secretly accepting foreign currency as payment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, the open acceptance of foreign currency payments at the shops has earned public ire. This suggests the authorities want to secure foreign currency, which is in short supply, but the policy contradiction is causing public chaos.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;The authorities are cracking down, so you can&#8217;t use foreign currency even if you have it, but the grain stores openly ask you to pay in Chinese money or dollars if you have it,&#8221; the source said. &#8220;That&#8217;s why people are complaining that they don&#8217;t know what to make of it.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Foreign currency is also accepted at state-run grain stores in Hyesan, Ryanggang province. The authorities are cracking down on individuals who use foreign currency for food purchases, but some of the grain shops in Hyesan prefer to use the yuan or other foreign currencies instead of local money when they sell food products to the public.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;Public dissatisfaction with the government&#8217;s crackdown on the use of foreign currency is growing. This is because grain stores are forcing people to spend foreign currency while the government is policing the public so that they can&#8217;t use Chinese money,&#8221; said a source in Ryanggang province. &#8220;In the past, people would have simply ignored it as absurd. But now that the authorities are cracking down harder than ever on private use of foreign currency, people are really unhappy.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;With the exchange rate souring every day for the past couple of money, more and more people want to hold foreign currency, so everyone is trying to have a little bit on them, even if it&#8217;s a small amount,&#8221; the source said. &#8220;Since the second half of the year, most transactions have been in yuan, because merchants also prefer foreign currency to local money.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>Daily NK works with a network of sources in North Korea, China, and elsewhere. For security reasons, their identities remain anonymous.<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"whitespace-pre-wrap break-words\"><em>Please send any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"whitespace-pre-wrap break-words\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailynk.com\/20241202-1\/\"><em>Read in Korean<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>North Korean state-run grain shops near the Chinese border have begun accepting foreign currency for food purchases, despite official restrictions on foreign currency use.\u00a0 This policy has sparked discontent among locals, as the government simultaneously cracks down on foreign currency use by the general public, according to a source in North Hamgyong province recently.\u00a0 Some [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":132,"featured_media":56335,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wikipediapreview_detectlinks":true,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,645],"tags":[271,714,773,930,1124,1439,100,222],"class_list":["post-62039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-economy","tag-ryanggang-province","tag-economy","tag-north-hamgyong-province","tag-foreign-currency","tag-crackdowns","tag-hoeryong","tag-markets","tag-border"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.7 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>N. Korean state shops near China allow food purchases in foreign currency - North Korea News \u2014 Daily NK | Latest DPRK Updates 2026<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"North Korean state-run grain shops near the Chinese border have begun accepting foreign currency for food purchases.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailynk.com\/english\/north-korean-state-shops-near-china-allow-food-purchases-foreign-currency\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"N. 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