North Korea is no stranger to chronic food shortages. For the past 17 consecutive years the UN Food and Agriculture Organization has placed the North on its list of countries in need of external assistance.

The FAO’s latest quarterly review, “Crop Prospects and Food Situation,” issued last month, says, “A large portion of the population suffers from low levels of food consumption and poor dietary diversity. The food security situation is expected to remain fragile, given persisting economic constraints aggravated by a below-average 2022 agricultural output.”

The actual situation may be much worse. North Korea watchers say the food situation has sunk to its worst point since famine engulfed the North in the mid-to-late 1990s. At the time, hundreds of thousands of people -- some 3-5 percent of the country’s population of about 20 million -- died in what Pyongyang called the “Arduous March.”

The Unification Ministry agrees with the assessment. It says deaths from starvation are believed to be occurring in some areas of North Korea, including Kaesong, one of the country’s largest cities. The National Intelligence Service admits that the number of hunger-related deaths in the isolated country is hard to estimate exactly, but it may not be so large yet as to threaten the regime.

North Korea’s grain production in 2022 amounted to 4.5 million metric tons, or 3.8 percent less than a year earlier, according to the Rural Development Administration. The country needs an estimated 5.5 million tons of grain to feed its 25 million people each year.

A clear sign of desperation came from the North’s leader, Kim Jong-un himself, calling for a “fundamental transformation” in farming and prioritizing hitting grain production targets this year. At a Workers’ Party meeting convened in February, he emphasized strengthening state control of farming and state-led economic plans, though with few details of his guidance or meaningful new strategies presented.

Kim’s display of urgency was long overdue. The food crisis in the North has been brewing for years as Kim directed his attention to building up nuclear arms and clamping down on economic reform. The result has been toughened international sanctions in reaction to the North’s long-range missile tests and less free market activity. Then the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns put a wrapper on the time bomb. External trade has been decimated.

The authoritarian regime had tolerated certain levels of open market activities, helping its modest economic growth. The trend continued into the early years of Kim Jong-un’s rule, which began in 2012. However, the Swiss-educated young leader, who had initially seemed open to foreign ideas and market reforms, has grown increasingly repressive. Meanwhile, North Korea’s state rationing system has largely remained broken since the 1990s famine, removing a safety net.

Kim has shut down outside influences, perceiving them as a threat to the dynastic rule of his family. In particular, after his attempts at summit dialogue with then-US President Donald Trump failed in 2019, Kim accelerated nuclear and missile armament. North Korea’s economy, which began a slow recovery in 1999, experienced negative growth in tandem.

Pyongyang’s repressive policies have choked off unofficial trade in markets where ordinary North Koreans buy products. Personal incomes dwindled and unofficial grain purchases from China also dropped sharply. Even before the pandemic, statistics show that nearly half of the population was undernourished.

Where is the current food crisis headed? Will children as well as pregnant and breastfeeding women once again suffer irreparable damage? In 2013, UNICEF reported that 27.9 percent of all North Korean children under the age of 5 experienced stunted growth due to malnutrition. They face a lifetime of irrevocable physical and mental challenges.

Will we once again see a large stream of North Korean refugees who have fled to China in pursuit of food and livelihoods, who then embark on perilous journeys to reach South Korea or a third country?

While the North fails to feed its people, it funnels its precious resources toward developing nuclear arms. North Koreans can only suffer silently, their voices muffled, behind their regime’s ebullient demonstration of military might, even turning down offers of help from a neighbor.

Last year, when the Yoon Suk Yeol administration proposed a package of economic assistance in return for denuclearization steps, Pyongyang flatly rejected it. Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of Kim Jong-un, slammed the offer, calling it the “height of absurdity.” She said, “Nobody barters their destiny for corn cake.”

It may seem too late now to persuade the North to terminate its nuclear program, given its advanced stage. However, the long-term solution to its economic difficulties lies in settling the standoff over nuclear weapons and sanctions, as well as the North’s economic reforms. The latter could only be made possible by settling the stalemate.

The ongoing escalation in military tensions in the region -- North Korea continuously upgrading its weapons of mass destruction, Japan dramatically increasing its military spending and China heightening its assertiveness in the South China Sea -- threatens peace more explicitly than ever. A rising number of South Koreans call for nuclear armament of their own, disbelieving in deterrence provided by the US.

The war in Ukraine has also factored into the regional geopolitics, with President Yoon opening possibilities for direct military assistance for Kyiv and Moscow criticizing Seoul’s involvement in the conflict. Reports on a potential deal between Moscow and Pyongyang to exchange food and munitions further complicates the already dangerous situation.

To prevent a greater fiasco and foreseeable mutually assured destruction, leaders of the two Koreas need to meet to resolve the imminent humanitarian problem of food insecurity and bring an end to chronic hunger in the North. Thus, they will avoid repeating the colossal failure of the 1990s to act and save lives. Hopefully, they may also start a broader dialogue with other concerned parties to bring peace and co-prosperity to the peninsula and beyond.

Lee Kyong-hee

Lee Kyong-hee is a former editor-in-chief of The Korea Herald. -- Ed.