North Korean Famine (1995–1998)

The North Korean famine lasted for most of the 1990s, experiencing its worst conditions around 1996 and 1997. Because of North Korea's insularity from the rest of the world, reliable data about the famine is hard to come by; not until the latter part of 1995 was the world [Page 447]even aware of the famine, though significant food shortages had been experienced for three years prior. Estimates of the length and extent of the famine have varied wildly, with the estimation of the death toll varying from 200,000 to more than three million (out of North Korea's population of 24 million). Early estimates of 10 percent of the population dying of starvation seem to have been skewed by reports coming from the country's capital city ...