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NKorea plan to ban hillside farms will increase hunger: aid group
Seoul (AFP) Nov 10, 2008 North Korea plans to replant barren hillsides in an apparent attempt to reduce flooding which has worsened acute food shortages, a South Korean aid group said Monday. But the eviction of hillside farmers, which has already begun, will only aggravate hunger in the short-term, according to the Good Friends group which has contacts in the hardline communist state. It said a policy decree issued on September 29 calls for all mountains to be reforested by 2012. Hill farms were to be confiscated as of next year but the policy had already begun in some areas, it said. The impoverished country suffered famine in the mid to late 1990s which killed hundreds of thousands, and still relies on foreign aid to help feed its 23 million people. The clearing of hillsides for firewood or to create more cropland is mainly to blame for frequent flooding. State policies such as an insistence on collective agriculture have also contributed to severe food shortages. Lee Seung-Yong, a Good Friends official, told AFP the policy would aggravate food shortages as many North Koreans make a living out of farming small lots on hillsides. Arable land is scarce in the hilly country. The group said in its newsletter that the policy is "unrealistic and not easy to achieve, as it tends to focus on enforcing the confiscating of small lots." North Korea should first resolve food problems and shortages of fuel for heating and cooking, it said. It quoted people in Booryong county of North Hamgyong Province as saying they were only able to survive this year by cultivating mountain slopes. When told of the new policy, one elderly man reportedly responded: "Then we're all going to die." The South Korean unification ministry said it was unaware of the new policy. Share This Article With Planet Earth
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