Food shortage in North Korea

NORTH KOREA faces a serious food shortage because the country probably won’t meet its agricultural production target for this year, the World Food Programme warned yesterday.

“My sense is that we have a crisis in front of us that requires the international community to respond and provide resources so that we can do our work,” said James Morris, executive director of the UN agency.

North Korea has relied on foreign aid to feed its 23 million people since disclosing in the mid-1990s that its government-run farm system had collapsed. A resulting famine is believed to have killed some two million people.