[Focus on the Korean Peninsula] 10,000 households, greenhouse farms… North Korea is focusing on 'large-scale construction'

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We will continue the conversation with Ahn Jung-sik, a reporter specializing in North Korea.

[Reporter Ahn Jung-shik, specializing in North Korea: From the outside, North Korea can be seen as focusing only on provocations while continuing to fire missiles and preparing for nuclear tests.

Representative construction works that North Korea started this year include the construction of a 10,000-family dwelling house in the Hwaseong district of Pyongyang and the construction of a large-scale vegetable greenhouse in Yeonpo, South Hamgyong Province.

The construction of 10,000 households in the Hwaseong district is an extension of the construction of 10,000 households in the Songhwa and Songhwa districts that started last year.

They say we are also increasing the supply of housing.

North Korea is also starting to supply large-scale housing, and Chosun Central TV reports this from time to time.]

[Reporter Ahn Jung-sik, specialized in North Korea: This is an action that is not well understood by our common sense.

If you look at a construction site in North Korea, you can easily see people singing and broadcasting through speakers.

This is the so-called propaganda and agitation squadron, and these propaganda groups appear not only at construction sites but also when planting rice in paddy fields.

You might be wondering what the hell are you doing, but this is happening because our system is different from ours.

In a capitalist society like ours, how do we get more work done, we have to pay more.

But North Korea is not capitalist, so you can't get work done in a way that pays more.

So, you have to do a job well, let's do better. You have to praise, encourage, and inspire in this way. This is what is called propaganda and agitation.

Singing and playing the guitar, whether in a factory or in a rice paddy field, encourages us to do better work, which may seem strange to us, but it is a very natural and common way in North Korea.]

[Ahn Jung-sik, reporter specializing in North Korea: There must be visible results.

The 15th is the 110th birthday of Kim Il-sung, so it is a very important anniversary for North Korea.

The construction of an attic-style residential district that North Korea is building on the banks of the Potong River in Pyongyang is almost complete.

On the eve of Kim Il-sung's birthday, General Secretary Kim Jong-un ordered to give entrance cards to those who will move in and to hold the completion ceremony.

There is nothing like construction by showing off visible achievements. North Korea seems to think so too.]