North Korea facing ‘tense food situation’: Kim Jong Un

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says the country is experiencing food shortages caused by recent natural disasters.

Citing typhoons and flooding, Kim told the plenary meeting of the Workers’ Party of Korea the country was in the midst of a “tense food situation,” according to reports.

North Korea faces international sanctions over its nuclear program and has closed its borders during the COVID pandemic, cutting off imports of food, fuel and fertilizers from China.

The extent of the shortages are unknown but believed to be serious and have sent food prices spiking, Korean Central News Agency said.

In this photo provided by the North Korean government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks during a Workers' Party meeting in Pyongyang, North Korea, Tuesday, June 15, 2021. Kim warned about possible food shortages and called for his people to brace for extended COVID-19 restrictions as he opened a major political conference to discuss national efforts to salvage a broken economy. the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said Wednesday, June 16, 2021. (朝鮮通信社/)

In April, at a similar meeting, Kim compared the situation to a time of extreme famine in the early 1990s following the collapse of the Soviet Union where as much as 10% of the population died from starvation.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has estimated that North Korea plans to only import about a fifth of the food it needs and that an increase in agriculture planting in 2020 was offset by extensive flooding.

The organization estimates North Korea could run out of food entirely between August and October.