Peace and Environment News* April 1996
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Peace and Environment News * April 1996 |
by Lynn Atkins
Last fall the isolationist government of North Korea stunned world watchers, not by instigating another round of nuclear-weapon brinksmanship, but by begging for food.
The country of 22 million, its economy already tottering from the loss of cut-rate imports of fuels, fertilizers, and food from China and the former U.S.S.R., was brought to its knees by the weather. Record-high floods, unleashed by a series of savage storms in July and August, devastated crops, roads, bridges, and whole towns in three-quarters of the nation. More than 200 people drowned; 500,000 were left homeless; 160,000 hectares out of a precious 1.4 million hectares of cropland were buried under coarse sand and stone.
Some foreign observers doubted the government's claim of economic losses of $15 billion. International disaster relief teams that surveyed the damage, however, confirmed that the catastrophe was real, and predicted the long-banished spectre of famine would return this winter if massive amounts of rice, cooking oil, blankets, clothing, medicine, and shelter materials did not begin arriving quickly.
But aid did not arrive quickly. And it has not arrived massively. In mid-December, Trevor Page, a veteran food-aid director with the World Food Program, described the response as "an absolute, deafening silence." Japan was a notably early and significant contributor. Denmark and Finland also gave. But most countries sat on their hands. It wasn't until late January that the U.S. pledged $2 million; about the same time, Canada donated $100,000 emergency funds to the Red Cross.
By February, just one-third of the $15 million sought by UN relief agencies had been pledged. The Red Cross had received only half of its $5 million relief chest.
Grain supplies for the current year are estimated to be 25 to 40 percent below minimum. This grim reality has caused the daily adult per capita grain ration to be slashed from 700 to 300 grams—just above starvation level. In sub-freezing January weather, schools closed throughout the country for lack of heat and electricity. When they re-opened in February, still cold and unlit, attendance was down 20 to 30 percent because of illness. By late February, UNICEF aid teams reported that grain supplies were exhausted.
The UN's World Health Organization fears that 2 million young children and half a million pregnant and nursing mothers increasingly risk malnutrition. Relief workers are describing conditions in many districts as "desperate" and individuals as "listless," children as "glassy eyed."
Some critically important supplies of blankets, clothing, medicine and rice have reached North Korea through UN agencies and the Red Cross. The World Council of Churches is speeding core funds into North Korea through a tiny but resilient community of Christian churches. With life-saving harvests months away, however, famine's lethal grip will tighten unless food aid increases.
A few individuals in Ottawa are looking for volunteers to help solicit donations on behalf of international relief agencies such as the Red Cross and the World Council of Churches. To learn more about what you can do, please contact Lynn Atkins at 235-3408. You can also contact the Canadian Council of Churches at 829-2333 or the Canadian Red Cross at 560-7440, local 329, or write them at 85 Plymouth St., Ottawa, K15 3E2.
Converted April 11, 2000 - Lg
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