North Korean Economy Watch - Latest Comments

Re: Friday Grab Bag

Gavin — Tue, 15 May 2012 04:15:35 -0000

I wouldn't say the new two-head badge is "very rare" in Pyongyang at least. I saw quite a lot of them while I was there last month.

Re: DPRK to join Paralympics for first time

jim — Fri, 11 May 2012 14:53:23 -0000

Reminds of the guide in Guy Delisle's book claiming that North Korea had no disabled people.

Re: Demonstration of KPA Unit 655

Aaa — Sun, 06 May 2012 22:16:38 -0000

Keep up the excellent work on North Korea Uncovered! We are all following the progress closely.

Re: KPA Exhibition of Arms and Equipment

Matt — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 20:37:41 -0000

When I first heard and saw this exhibit I thought it was constructed to show off products of the DPRK armaments industry to potential foreign customers to third world countries. Do you think this could be a potential use of this facility?

Re: Friday Fun: A little bit of everything

Otavio — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 14:13:23 -0000

Quite impressive what mr. Constantin Pîrvulescu did. You need balls to go to a commie rally and spoke against the current leader, if you fail to convince the audience then you known what will happen. Unfortunately the guy failed :(

Re: South urges DPRK agricultural reforms

P'yongan Society Journal — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 15:57:27 -0000

I wonder how suitable a Chinese example is to North Korea today. At the time of the Xiaogang contract Chinese farmers had only been in collectives for less than 30 years. Families still possessed much of the knowledge and skills to farm independently once reforms began.

In contrast, North Koreans farmers have been tied to the collectives for more than 50 years and may have more in common, albeit not nearly as well off, as were their counterparts in the former Soviet Union or many parts of Eastern Europe. The uncertainly, real and perceived, of continued food and energy shortages, infrastructure deterioration, environmental degradation, and imperfect markets, may also drive (if it hasn't already) many farmers into subsistence farming in which case they will not help much in addressing food shortages or the the greater economy.

Personal farming, although almost always more productive that the collectives, can also become highly dependent (parasitic?) of collective assets, inputs, and institutions in which case privatization, if not done carefully, can also lead to stagnation.

Reform is certainly needed to North Korea's agriculture sector. It is just we should be well-aware that reform too could be a lame duck if not handled or supported properly. Once place I feel the Xiaogang example is quite illustrative is of the ability of farmers to shape/resist/influence a system, especially one facing food shortages, but we should remember they don't always shape it in the way we (or state planners for that matter) may hope for. Thanks for posting this! Real important stuff to be thinking about.

Re: Phyongsong restaurant street opens

Cogsinister — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 10:40:33 -0000

I should hope so......

Re: Phyongsong restaurant street opens

GagHalfrunt — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 06:54:39 -0000

I assume that "entrails soup" sounds more appetising in the original Korean.

Re: North Korea, concrete utopia: Architecture as a propaganda weapon in North Korea

NK econWatch — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 09:55:31 -0000

Yes, I am well aware of Meuser's book and have posted links to it on this site on several occasions. I have not read it, however. Still, I think you make a decent point and I edited the language.

Re: North Korea, concrete utopia: Architecture as a propaganda weapon in North Korea

Guest — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 04:20:41 -0000

"'North Korea, concrete utopia' (Muñoz Moya Publishers) is the title of
the first essay published outside the Korean border on the use of
architecture as a propaganda weapon in North Korea."

-> No it's not. The highly recommendable "Architekturführer Pjöngjang" by Philipp Meuser (only a german version available until now) released in 2011 is focussing on exactly the same issue and provides hundreds of excellent pictures. See here:
http://www.amazon.de/Architekt...

Re: WIPO project in the DPRK

GagHalfrunt — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 06:06:21 -0000

Kim Il Sung University also uses HP computers.

HP may huff and puff (no pun intended) about "supplier agreements" and US export laws, but I wouldn't have thought that they can stop dealers in China selling HP products to North Korea. The dealers are not breaking any Chinese laws, and the North Korean customers can always hide behind a Chinese front company.

Re: Pyongyang Metro Maps

Pilot53 — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 19:15:00 -0000

Where is the Namsan station on your Google Earth map? is it a stop or not?

Re: Rocket control center location

Asdafas — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 15:34:26 -0000

Who wants to guess how many NKers will be sent to one of the concentration camps because of this launch failure? :(

Re: Rocket control center location

Gggg — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 18:22:29 -0000

Thanks for taking some time to update!

Re: Mansudae Area renovation no. 2

Guest — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 14:11:09 -0000

Hi,

I am the "recent visitor" that took the pictures from the reconstruction last year. Of course you are welcome to use the photo, but I would have liked to have been asked about the use of it.

By the way, the photo was taken from the top of the Juche Tower with a 200mm zoom lens. :-)

Cheers.

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

Mr. Brown — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 12:11:27 -0000

Thanks for clarifying, Curtis. I really enjoy seeing these "less propagandist" pictures that don't seem geared towards making money. If you find more, I'd love to see them.

Thanks for the links, Joseph. Can you tell us more about the pottery studio?

Re: American chorus to perform at Spring Arts Festival

Me — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 16:16:04 -0000

This singing group is entirely made up of Southern Baptist preachers - no mention of that.

Re: Mansudae Area renovation no. 2

Guest — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 03:55:57 -0000

I wonder what those three large buildings east of the new theatre (=below in the satellite picture) might be and how they'll turn out when finished. They've were not included in the original planning maps/pictures of the area, where their location was foreseen to be planted with grass/trees. Also interesting to see another large building being in construction right opposite of the Taedong.

Re: Kwangmyongsong-3 rocket launch compendium

Gggg — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 20:01:01 -0000

Usually you would want to launch in the direction of the Earth's spin, as that gives you additional speed to reach orbit. Launching due south seems to be more for political reasons. I don't think even they will expect it to reach orbit.

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

GagHalfrunt — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 06:32:08 -0000

The reflection of the barmaid in House of Affection might be a rip-off of/homage to Edouard Manet's A Bar at the Folies-Bergère.

If so, the North Korean artist has seen fit to correct the decadent old French painter who painted the bar straight on, where the barmaid's reflection ought to be hidden behind her. :)

Re: About “North Korean Economy Watch”

Kim — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:58:29 -0000

A good documentary about North Korean workers y labor camps situated in Russia:
Kim Jong Il's Foreign Adventure - North Korea

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

Joseph — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 04:41:42 -0000

Here are a few more I took my trip to DPRK last year:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/j...

http://americaninnorthkorea.co...

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

Floyd Geron Looney — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 22:29:50 -0000

Girl with cell phone.... defect and come here. lol.

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

Mieu — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 14:14:13 -0000

hi curtis,

I come to your website everyday, but sometimes I found that many articles popping out in just a day after a few days of no articles, but these new articles all have different date from each other. Is this a connection problem from my side (I live in the middle kingdom) or is it what you have intended?

Re: Friday Fun: Some new North Korean art

NK econWatch — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 09:35:13 -0000

Dear Mr. Brown,

You are correct. The lower painting is from a book, not the Mansudae Art Studio. I believe the lower painting is of the interior of the Kyonghung Restaurant (경훙관), which is, as far as I am aware, Pyongyang's largest beer hall.