North Korea’s rocket costs as much as a year’s worth of food

[best2002]

Ministry of Unification estimated the cost of North Korea's two rocket launches this year to be nearly equivalent to a year's worth of food for the country. An official with the ministry told reporters on Dec. 6 that North Korea had spent a total of US$1.34 billion on rocket launches since the Kim Jong-un regime took power this in April of this year.

This is enough money to buy a year's worth of food for North Korea (5.3 million tons of corn). The North Korean food demand for one year is equivalent to 5.3 million tons of corn, which is valued at US$1.5 billion according to international market rates. The country's annual food shortfall is estimated at one million tons, or about US$300 million.

By this standard, the total of US$1.34 billion would be nearly equal to the annual cost of food and enough to cover the shortfall for four to five years. Analysts said the ministry's aim in comparing the rocket development costs with the North Korean food situation was to highlight the immorality of the regime in Pyongyang. I hope North Korea will put their toward solving its peoples’ food shortage.

(http://news.yahoo.com/north-korea-considers-delaying-rocket-launch-021637034.html;_ylt=A2KLOzJLQsVQIDAASP7QtDMD)

[HankyDub]

1. How many years of food could we buy for N Korea

if we could recoup the money blatantly wasted on military toys?

[quakerboy]

2. As a way of measuring cost, I like it.

I wonder how other countries compare on a similar scale. US rockets VS annual food cost? Russia? Israel? France?. Or expand it to total military cost. That would make an interesting graph, how many annual foods each country spends on its military.