(UTV|COLOMBO) – North Korea has said it is suffering its worst drought in 37 years and called on its citizens to “battle” against the crop damage caused by it.
It comes after the UN said that up to 10 million North Koreans were “in urgent need of food assistance”.
North Koreans had been surviving on just 300g (10.5 oz) of food a day so far this year, the UN report said.
In the 1990s, a devastating famine is believed to have killed hundreds of thousands of North Koreans.
There is no indication as yet that this drought will be as severe, but it follows a slew of warnings about poor harvests and crop damage across the country.
“As yet it’s not really clear how bad things are as, with everything related to North Korea, the data is hardly transparent,” Oliver Hotham from NK News told the BBC.
But, he points out, that if official data is accurate, their research suggests North Korea would need to import as much as 1.5 million tonnes of food to make up for the shortfall in production. (Courtesy: BBC)
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