PRESS CONFERENCE BY WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME

13 February 1997

Press Briefing

PRESS CONFERENCE BY WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME

19970213 FOR INFORMATION OF UNITED NATIONS SECRETARIAT ONLY

An urgent appeal for $41.6 million in emergency food aid for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was made by the World Food Programme (WFP) at a Headquarters press conference this afternoon. Making the appeal, Douglas Casson Coutts, Director of the New York Office of the WFP, said 1.7 million people were at risk due to the heavy floods that had affected the country for a second year in succession.

The present appeal by the WFP was its third request for assistance from donors, he said. The Programme had launched an appeal for approximately $8 million in early 1996, followed by an appeal for approximately $27 million. The current appeal for $41.6 million would provide roughly 100,000 tons of food, he said.

A WFP/Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) crop assessment mission had been organized in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in autumn 1996, he continued. Such a mission was typically organized after harvest season in countries with similar food problems. It had been found that the Government had a shortfall of 2.3 million tons -- the difference between what it needed to feed its population of 23 million and what it had actually produced.

The WFP had calculated that, at most, the Government would be able to import 500,000 tons of food on a commercial basis, he said. Thus, there would be a need of about 1.8 million tons of food. The WFP was trying to meet a very small percentage of that overall food need. However, its programme was targeted towards collective farmers in rural areas who had been most affected by the floods of 1995 and 1996.

Further details on the appeal were available in a fact sheet and news release that had been circulated by the WFP, Mr. Coutts said. According to the fact sheet, the appeal's duration would be one year, from April 1997 to March 1998, and 80 per cent of the aid would be in the form of grain to support food-for-work projects to help farmers reclaim flood-damaged land and rebuild ruined infrastructure in preparation for the next crop season. The remaining 20 per cent, or 20,000 tons, would be in the form of fortified cereal mix for children under the age of five.

In addition, the fact sheet indicates that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea had entered 1997 with an estimated deficit of 2.36 million tons of food -- a roughly 50 per cent shortfall that was proportionately higher than the one that had precipitated the great Ethiopian famine of 1985.

When would the WFP send a team to analyse the needs of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea? a correspondent asked. Mr. Coutts said the agencies would be sending a mission sometime in late winter, around March, under the aegis of the Department for Humanitarian Affairs, for an overall assessment of the country's non-food needs. The food needs were fairly well understood at present. Therefore, any appeal that would result from the mission would include the present food appeal.

There was speculation that farmers in collective farms were being forced to provide rations for soldiers, a correspondent said. Was the WFP positive that emergency food aid was not being used for military purposes? he asked. Explaining the system in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Mr. Coutts said 65 per cent of its population of 23 million people received all of its food through the Public Distribution System (PDS). However, there were two main groups outside that system -- the collective farmers, who were targeted in the present programme, and the military. To WFP's knowledge, the military had its own food stocks and fed itself. "We have a very carefully monitored programme through our staff in Pyongyang and in the countryside and we monitor at each stage along the way of the distribution, and I can assure you that there is no food in any of these programmes going to the military", he said.

Before the floods, when the PDS was better able to pay for the commercial food imports, it had a very extensive and sophisticated system of distribution set up, he continued. Under that system of distribution, rations were disbursed on a gram-per-day basis, according to occupation. However, the system had been severely affected by the flood of 1995. There were reports from the WFP staff that rations currently being distributed amounted only to roughly 100 to 200 grams per person per day [according to the WFP fact sheet, that amount is roughly equivalent of roughly one-half bowl of rice and is barely one sixth of the ration normally distributed to refugees in other crises]. "That is not sustainable", Mr. Coutts said. "Remember, this is a very cold climate, they have a winter comparable to the Canadian winter and they have a short growing season."

Asked if he expected the alleged defection of Hwang Jang Yop, a high official of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, to have an impact on the emergency food appeal in any way, Mr. Coutts said, "We are sending out this appeal to all our main donors." The list of donors who had contributed so far was attached to the fact sheet that had been circulated. He stressed that the WFP was not the solution to the food problem in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Countries in the region that had a special relationship with the country had to be the key to meeting the larger need. It was hoped that countries in the region would understand that the situation was very serious, based on WFP research, and help with both the targeted programme on the multilateral side and through possible bilateral arrangements. The WFP wanted all bilateral donors to know that it had staff in the country and was fully functional. It could provide a level of confidence to donors that the food was ending up where it was supposed to.

WFP Press Conference - 3 - 13 February 1997

Pressed further on the matter of the impact of the alleged defection, Mr. Coutts said the WFP was a voluntary programme of the United Nations system and it received from donors what they were willing to give. He hoped that any of bilateral problems that might come up with any countries that were donating to the programme would be settled separately. "We are trying to maintain a humanitarian effort in this programme, quite aside from the political considerations", he said.

Asked for an estimate of when the actual food distribution would start, Mr. Coutts said roughly 80,000 tons of food had been distributed over the last 15 months since the programme began. The pipeline had been somewhat dry in the past few months. However, the WFP now had confirmation of a European Union contribution of roughly $7 million and a smaller Swiss contribution which was now being programmed. The problem was that, based on the available food supply, the WFP had only a few months food to provide to its beneficiaries. Moreover, based on the level of stocks that the Government had and based on the level of need, it was expected that it would completely run out of food by May or June of this year. That applied to the entire PDS in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, which was already under very dire stress.

It seemed that only half of the amount requested in the appeal had been provided, a correspondent said. What was the reason for the low donation and what could be done to get countries to donate more? he asked. "I think you are referring to the overall Department for Humanitarian Affairs inter-agency managed appeals", Mr. Coutts said, adding that, on the food side, they had been subscribed to almost 100 per cent. However, that was not the case on the non-food side. The donors were most focused on the Government's main priority, which was the food problem.

He added that the coping mechanisms and pre-famine indicators in Democratic People's Republic of Korea were somewhat different from the African famine situations. There were no incidents of mass population shifts, there were no instances of people selling clothes or assets, since it was a different system, with no free movement of population and no open market. It had taken the WFP some time to understand the coping mechanism of the population -- foraging for food on the mountainsides. However, the accumulated effect of two very hard winters was now visible and the people's resistance was dropping. "You don't die from hunger directly, you die from diseases and other effects of malnutrition", he said.

Asked why the WFP was not making an appeal for a larger amount, he said "we are trying at this stage to maintain confidence with all of the donors" and keeping the programme targeted towards those most in need. However, there was a broader structural problem in the agricultural sector. While the United Nations system was interested in helping in that respect, it had been much more difficult to raise funds on the non-food side.

WFP Press Conference - 4 - 13 February 1997

Mr. Coutts added that as a result of the Government's scarce foreign exchange, not only was it unable to import adequate food, but there was an acute fuel shortage. That had become evident in WFP's work with the collective farms. Moreover, the school system in the country had been forced to schedule "summer" holidays in the coldest month of winter, due to a lack of fuel to heat classrooms. He reiterated that those were pre-famine indicators.

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