The Quality of Life of North Korean: Current Status and Understanding

Should be of interest for those who want to know what life is like inside north Korea.  There are some very important insights in this and for those who someday may have to operate there I recommend reading this and keeping it for reference.  You can download the enture report at the link below from the Korean Institute for National Unification.

V/R

Dave

The Quality of Life of North Korean: Current Status and Understanding

http://www.kinu.or.kr/eng/pub/pub_02_01.jsp?bid=DATA05&page=1&num=140&mode=view&category

Author Kim Soo Am, Kim Kook Shin, Kim Young Yoon, Lim Soon Hee, Jeong Eun Mee, Park Young Ja Publish Date / Page 2012-12-31 / 62 p. Series No. Study Series 2012-02 File

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  North Korea’s economic difficulties during the mid-1990s were the decisive factor in fundamentally damaging the North Korean people’s quality of life. The standard of living has deteriorated to extreme levels of deprivation in which the right to food security, the right to health and other minimum needs for human survival are denied. Since its inauguration, the Lee Myung-bak administration has proposed policies that strive to improve the North Korean people’s “quality of life” by providing humanitarian aid to the North. Although concern regarding the “quality of life” has been discussed with a focus on aid provisions, the reality is that there is a lack of specific analyses on this subject. It is true that one can refute such analyses by stating that it would be pointless to discuss the quality of life when the North Korean economy is in a state of ruin. However, an academic approach is necessary in such discussions as a means to evaluate the propriety of applying international views onto the concept of the quality of life. With this perspective, the paper aims to review the possibility of applying international standards onto North Korea in order to systematically analyze the phenomenon that has disintegrated its quality of life. Should the international views be applicable, then this paper will explore the means by which they can be applied while also acknowledging North Korea’s special characteristics...