A new famine in late 2018/early 2019 is very likely unless UN sanctions are lifted, or China, Russia or others provide massive food aid to the beleaguered regime.
Agriculture accounts for 22% of North Korea’s GDP, employs between 37-40% of the population. With a mere 22% of the total land area of North Korea arable, an imminent crop failure will have serious consequences for regime stability if no headway is made on US sanctions talks.
In 2017 most of North Korea’s grain import came from China and increased three times according to Chinese customs data. Wheat (81,653 tons) was the biggest import, followed corn (57,887 tons) and rice (35,408 tons). Corn imports jumped 16 times to 31,235 tons, and flour imports -which stood at 7,000 tons- increased 12 times from the previous year.
Source: frontera.net
