North Korea's Kim Jong Un sweats over food shortage, holds rare meeting on agricultural practices

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is scurrying to solve the food crisis in the country. The authoritarian leader on Monday held a rare political conference, which continued on Tuesday to engineer solutions to increase agricultural production, according to state media reports.

The food shortage crisis in North Korea is worsening and Kim has dubbed hitting 'grain production' targets as the major priority. Though the reports did not detail what measures Kim's government would take, they suggested that changes were in the offing.

The meeting by Kim comes a few weeks after South Korea’s Unification Ministry stated that the food situation in their neighbourhood 'seemed to have deteriorated'.

Some unsubstantiated reports have claimed that an unknown number of North Koreans have died due to starvation but there is no concrete indication that famine has set in the country.

However, a report published by US-based monitoring project 38 North in January stated that the situation was grim in the country.

“Food availability has likely fallen below the bare minimum with regard to human needs,” read the report.

“Achieving adequate agricultural output in North Korea’s unfavourable soils has, ironically, generated a heavy reliance on imported goods and left the country exposed to global shocks, diplomatic conflicts, and adverse weather,” it added.

Ostracised by most countries across the globe, North Korea is a pariah state where the authoritarian regime of Kim Jong Un uses almost all the revenue for its missile programmes instead of food production or public welfare.

The international sanctions coupled with pandemic isolation and in-house mismanagement may have contributed heavily to the food shortage situation, according to experts.

The gravity of the matter can be understood by the fact that it was the first time that a plenary session was convened, only to discuss agricultural matters.

(With inputs from agencies)

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