The difference in physical size between North and South Koreans has grown so large that experts here are concerned it will cause problems if the two Koreas unify.
Pak Sun-young, an anthropology professor of Seoul National University, said a 10-year-old North Korean boy is 6.6 centimeters (2.6 inches) shorter than his South Korean counterpart on average, while a 10-year-old North Korean girl is 4.4 centimeters shorter.
She said the height gap tends to get wider for older defectors. She based her research on the body measurements of 1, 193 North Korean children and youngsters who entered South Korea between 1999 and April 2006.
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Ms. Park said the differences in their physiques could result in discrimination against former North Koreans after a possible unification, and could cause them to feel alienated.
It took two decades for South Korean children to grow by 5.6 centimeters, experts said, adding that the height of North Korean children will reduce even further unless the country opens up soon.
“When pregnant women and infants are malnourished, the physical development of not only themselves but their children and grandchildren are influenced, ” said Chang Nam-soo, professor of food and nutritional sciences at Ewha Womans University. “Their stunted physiques will be handed down through generations.”
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Experts warned about the dangers faced by babies born to malnourished mothers. Such children are highly likely to suffer from a low immune capability, weakened physical, intellectual and scholastic abilities, a low labor productivity and a higher risk of geriatric diseases, they said.
The five 13-year-old boys had fled their communist country three or four months earlier, and came to South Korea almost directly, without spending significant time in China. The average height of the boys was 136.7 centimeters and their weight was 36.7 kilograms (80.9 pounds), far below the average height of 158.2 centimeters and 51 kilograms for the South Korean boys of the same age.
“North Korean defector children seem to be about four or five years younger than their actual age, because of their slow physical development, ” said a teacher to one of the boys.
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At an elementary school in Wonsan, North Korea, children drink soy milk provided by The First Steps, a Canada-based relief group, at the end of last year. Provided by The First Steps
From 1965 to 1985, when quick industrialization took place in South Korea, the average height of 3-year-old children grew from 89 centimeters to 94.6 centimeters.
According to the United Nations Population Fund, 43 out of 1, 000 North Korean infants died within one year after their births last year, 13 times higher than the figure for the South, where the figure was 3 out of 1, 000.
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In addition to the infant death rate, another UN body also released statistics in 2004 after surveying 4, 800 households with children under the age of 7 across North Korea.
In the largest ever UN survey on North Korea, more than 32 percent of the 2, 109 mothers who had children younger than 2 suffered from malnourishment.
Two of the women weighed less than 45 kilograms. “Inside their bodies, the fetuses developed with malnutrition, ” said Kim Dong-soo, professor of medicine at Yonsei University and a pediatrician at Severance Hospital. “Even after the babies are born, their heights are inevitably underdeveloped because they can not receive nutritional breast feeding.”
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Experts said the situation could be improved with a support program to provide nutritional foods to pregnant mothers, infants and children and medical goods and as well as an improvement in the country’s health and hygiene systems.
“When we issue sanctions against North Korea, the elite members and the soldiers will survive, but the vulnerable classes will suffer the fatal blow, ” said Suh Young-hoon, former head of South Korea’s Red Cross Society. “After unification, those people will be Korean citizens.”
While some groups worry about the possible diversion of aid to fund the Kim Jong-il regime, others highlight the positive side of the assistance programs, particularly the eventual drop in the costs of unification.
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“After unification, 90 percent of the 23 million North Koreans will be among the poorest in the welfare system, and that will immediately raise medical insurance budgets by at least 54 trillion won ($57.6 billion) a year, ” said Chung Woo-jin, professor of public health at Yonsei University.
As of now, about 20 relief groups in South Korea are engaged in programs to support North Korean children. Experts and the activists agreed such programs will be beneficial only when they are operated openly, with the ability to follow up on where the aid goes. “It is hard to ask North Korean authorities to cooperate with our monitoring because the project may fall apart, ” said an activist from a relief group, on the condition of anonymity.
Yun Hwan-chol, of the Korean Sharing Movement, was more aggressive. “It is now time to present a global standard of relief program to the North and demand the North Koreans meet it, ” he said.
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The country is often depicted as isolated and thoroughly out of step with the 21st century. Statistics are hard to get and often based on estimates, but what can they tell us about life in the North?
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Kim Il-sung effectively founded North Korea in 1948 and his family dynasty has ruled the country ever since, with control passing from father to son.
In the same period South Korea has managed six republics, a revolution, a couple of coups and the transition to free and fair elections. In total 12 presidents have led the country, covering 19 terms of office.
Three million mobile phones might seem like a lot - but in a country of 25 million it amounts to just over one out of every ten people. Most mobile users are likely to be concentrated in the capital Pyongyang.
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With effectively a single network, Koryolink, North Korea's mobile market is limited but growing. Originally established as a partnership with Egyptian telecom firm Orascom, it was for many years the only option.
However, in 2015 Orascom discovered that North Korea was setting up a rival network, Byol, and was forced to disclose to investors that it had effectively lost control over the service's three million plus subscribers.
Research by the US-Korea Institute at SAIS suggests that some growth might be down to North Koreans calculating that it's cheaper to buy an additional subscription than additional air time.
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As well as a scarcity of mobiles, the vast majority of North Koreans are only permitted access to the country's 'private internet' - effectively a closed intranet operating on a national scale.
It may sound like an urban myth, but there is some research to suggest that North Korean men are on average shorter than their South Korean counterparts.
Professor Daniel Schwekendiek from Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul studied the heights of North Korean refugees measured when they crossed the border into South Korea and found an average 3-8cm (1.2 -3.1 inch) difference.
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Images from North Korea's capital Pyongyang often show stretches of wide, pristine motorway unoccupied by traffic, but outside the city it's another story.
North Korea has some 25, 554 km of roads, according to 2006 figures, but just 3% are actually paved, amounting to a meagre 724km (449 miles).
It's also estimated that only about 11 out of every 1, 000 North Koreans owns a car, which means a long queue at the bus stop for most people who need to travel.
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North Korea relies on coal exports to keep its economy above water - but it's hard to measure their true value as the data comes from countries receiving the coal.
Much of North Korea's coal is exported to China, which banned imports in February 2017. However some analysts question the nature of the sanction.
There are folks who track ships and have seen North Korean ships docking at coal terminals at Chinese ports even after the ban. I do believe that China has disrupted coal imports, but not completely, says Kent Boydston, research analyst at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
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Since then, South Korea has rocketed ahead to become one of the world's leading industrial producers, with companies like Samsung and Hyundai becoming global household names.
Military spending is estimated to account for as much as 25% of GDP, and almost every North Korean man undergoes some form of military training.
A series of famines in the late 1990s caused a
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