| Hat tip Josh Stanton at One Free Korea. |
North Korea has a cooperative farming system where individuals are, in principle, banned from owning farms or smallholdings. Nevertheless, many individuals cultivate their own crops, and this is done quite openly.
But there have been serious differences in production success this year, according to sources; it has been a good year for privately owned plots, particularly in the regions of Hamgyong, Chagang and Yanggang provinces; but famine conditions have been witnessed on state-run cooperatives.
State security agents are said to have reported to the Central Committee that 'private agriculture is becoming dangerously widespread.' In response, the instructions given by the Committee has been to destroy all crops on private fields. Labour and student groups have now been mobilised to cut down privately grown crops, as these have been grown on the 'private gardens of capitalism.'
Even recently,
Sources report that even in group situations, North Korean individuals are heard asking questions such as, 'How can [Kim Jong-un's] belly be so round when he is reduced to eating potatoes out of concern for his people?'