Kim Jong Un desperately begs North Korean citizens to earn more money

SEOUL—North Korea is paying much attention to the production of manure because it shoot rockets, and it doesn’t matter if it comes from a person or an animal.

While testing two missiles in less than a week, North Korea waged a “war for dung,” which is far more important to the average North Korean citizen than firing another test-firing. into the sea off the east coast.

The task has reached crisis point in the past two years as fertilizer almost stopped being imported from China after the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un Borders closed at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. And then, in March of last year, the North turned down grants from South Korea and demanded an end to sanctions imposed by the United States and the United Nations.

Victor Cha, director of North Korean affairs at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told The Daily Beast, speaking to The Daily Beast. “It was an interesting ‘smell’ commentary on how dire the crop situation would be without the annual fertilizer provided by Korea.”

And it’s all going, Cha said, while “we don’t stop squeezing ourselves out of the crap created by North Korea’s latest missile launches,” most recently on Wednesday. Three.

Follow Daily import, which oversees North Korea from within the country, access to markets is closed to those who do not fulfill their quotas.

With poop, not rockets, ranks as the “first struggle” for the new year, said Daily import, the authorities have “basically pressured people” to qualify for a “feces pass” as well as South Korean citizens needing a “quarantine pass” to confirm that they have been vaccinated. COVID-19 prevention.

Fertilizer production norms from 200 kg per household t0 500 kg for everyone working in state factories, Daily import reported, but everyone had a break. Markets this month started opening an hour later in the afternoon, from 3 to 5 instead of 2 to 5, to “have an extra hour to produce manure”.

It is not clear how much manure is donated in a country lacking animals, but the term “homemade” appears frequently in North Korean media reports with many praising the effort. Scattered enough manure since sanctions and COVID-19 started cutting off supplies from China and South Korea in 2020.

“Homemade” by definition includes manure made from manure of any kind, human or animal, along with weeds, garbage and even chemical ash. Perhaps cows, which farms often rely on instead of machines for farming, are also a major source.

In a district in Pyongyang, in English Pyongyang Times, a cooperative farm distributed “hundreds of tons of homemade manure per hectare of vegetables”. Another district produced “homemade manure” for potato cultivation 1.2 times more than the previous year.

North Korea’s propaganda machine does not frame the struggle in terms of incentives or sanctions but reports the campaign distributed with enthusiasm typically reserved for missile launches.

People in Jagang province, which borders China, “delivered tens of thousands of tons of manure to cooperative livestock farms in three days through the first campaign of this year,” one breathless report. by the Korean Central News Agency of Pyongyang. “Officers from provincial facilities took the lead in the campaign, guiding the transportation of manure to the fields.”

Down in South Hwanghae province, southwest of Pyongyang, North Korean Prime Minister Kim Tok Hun, visiting a fertilizer factory earlier this month, called for “carpeting” farmland “with good quality manure.” to “increase the fertility of the soil.”

Urine is also in demand, according to Radio Free Asia, a US-funded website that often reports on contacts inside North Korea. The Rural Management Committee in a province bordering China “instructed farmers to donate their urine to mix in compost,” RFA reported in May.

The RFA quoted a source as saying workers were “forced to carry two liters of urine per person per day to mix in the compost pile until production targets are reached” and must “monitor their urine donations”. them in a notebook.”

Such reports appear to be aimed at increasing competition among regions as well as officials and individuals for the honor of producing the most manure.

“The authorities are clearly creating an atmosphere of competition,” said Daily import, reported that directors and officials were “focused on fulfilling their quotas, fearing that lagging units would face ‘review’ – an obvious proverbial to be severely punished.” Low-ranking officials “are protecting themselves” by penalizing those who do not meet quotas, the report said.

Kim Jong Un in his meetings with the leaders of the ruling Workers’ Party of which he is General Secretary, has repeatedly put the focus on leading agriculture. In his final address to party members at the end of the year, according to KCNA, he said the country faced “a great life-and-death struggle” that required “radical progress in solving the problem”. food, clothing and housing” – language that would seem to make it clear that he was more interested in feeding his people than firing rockets.

Kim did not go into specifics in his speech, but KCNA quoted him in 2014 as advising agricultural leaders to “use all sources of manure such as cattle manure, nightshade [human excrement], compost and trench soil. “