Global Food Crisis Fund grant of $60,000 will support farming in North Korea.

An allocation of $60,000 from the General Board's Global Food Crisis Fund has been approved to support a farm rehabilitation project in two western provinces of North Korea.

The project, called Ryongyun Agro-Marin Industrial Development Center, is a joint venture of Agglobe Services International and the Korean Unpasan General Trading Company. It strives to bolster the economic, health, and educational welfare of the region's 25,000 inhabitants. The funds will be used to purchase barley and rice seeds, along with other planting materials.

The barley seeds are being rushed to the country to meet an early March planting date required for double cropping during the upcoming season, which follows a harsh winter. The rice will be transplanted to paddy fields in June, after the barley is harvested. It is part of a $2.3 million Ryongyun development effort seeking to rehabilitate 24,000 acres of farmland.

Dr. Pilju Kim Joo, a consultant to the Global Food Crisis Fund since 1996, is supervising the program. The fund supplied $50,000 in aid to two other projects in North Korea in 2003, adding to a total of more than $600,000 sent to the nation since 1995.

Source: Newsline 2/06/2004
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