NORTH KOREA

AREA OF EXPERTISE

Food security and livelihoods

FUNDING

• Funding: European Union (90%), Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)
  
  
• Final beneficiaries: The target groups of the action are mainly the children in welfare institutions in Sohung city, and in the 4 farms targeted by the project, who will have an increased access to vegetable products (2,289 children in total). Sohung City includes a nursery (452 children) and a kindergarten (676 children). The 262 staff of the working units of the 4 targeted farms and the staff from the children institutions (274 persons), compose the rest of the target groups that will benefit from improved working conditions and from the capacity-building component of the action. The target groups represent a total of 2,825 people. The final beneficiaries of the action are the 30,000 inhabitants of the city of Sohung and the 12,578 inhabitants of the farms.
  
  
• Partners:
  Ministry of City Management
  Academy of Science and Agriculture
  Anti-Epidemic Service (AES) of Sohung
  Central Vegetable Research Institute
  People's Committees (PC) of Sohung

Passive solar greenhouses at the farm of Onsil, supporting indoor cultivation, improving thermal insulation during the winter and ventilation in the summer

In order to durably improve the intake and quality of vegetables available for Sohung County inhabitants and children in social institutions, both supply chain stakeholders and TGH emphasized that the overall vegetable production needs to be improved as well as the distribution of goods and the hygiene and diet management capacities.

Greenhouses in Bo Pan, waiting to be rehabilitated

The action was designed according to these collaborative conclusions and had the following results:

• Increased vegetables production
  
  In Sohung County cooperative farms, the vegetable production structurally do not meet the needs of the population, especially in urban areas. Through a sensitive nutritional approach, this increase of vegetables production is a sine qua non condition to the improvement of diet diversity.
  
  It appeared as a priority to increase vegetables production in four farms of Sohung County ensuring the vegetables production for children institutions, by working on different issues (cropping season’s duration, improved agriculture practices, improved soil fertility management). The specific outputs are: labour productivity has increased, the vegetables cropping season has been extended by one month in Sohung’s farms, the cultivated surface of winter vegetables (greenhouses) has increased from 0 to 2 ha, the quantity of manure has increased, and soil fertility has been improved thanks to additional quantities of fertilizer produced.

• Improved post-production practices
  
  Around 30% of the vegetable production of Sohung farms is dedicated to supply Sohung City, including children institutions. During the harvest season, both farm and institution managers estimate post-harvest loss at around 25%, mainly due to a low availability of the labour force at the peak of the harvest period, inappropriate storage means (vegetables rotten before deliveries and smashed during transport), and non-regular delivery capacity (random access to transport means and fuel on the farms). In order to improve the quality of the products provided to the children, transportation means need to be improved, as well as conservation and distribution means both at farm and institution levels.
  
  The project's expected outputs are the following: to lower vegetable supply chain losses during harvest/conservation/transportation by 50%, and reduce losses within institutions.

• Capacity building of local stakeholders in production, post-production and hygiene management
  
  Capacity building of the project’s stakeholders is essential to adapt the production system to the proposed innovations and to take advantage of increased labour productivity. Activities like pest management, crop rotation, and fodder production will thus be improved. This way, the proposed action addresses the challenge of sustainability.
  
  This action aims at strengthening the knowledge and capacities of the local stakeholders associated to it: the People’s Committees of Sohung City (PC), the Anti Epidemic Service of Sohung (AES) and the Academy of Agriculture and Sciences (AAS), through research, experimentation work and exchanges with international experts, and at facilitating the dissemination of this knowledge, thus allowing the replication of the project at county level through training and publications.