North Korean trade with biggest partner China dives 48 per cent amid sanctions

Reliance on communist neighbour takes overall foreign trade volume below US$3 billion for first time since Kim Jong-un took power, according to report

Observers say slow economic growth could weaken regime in the long run, but Beijing is expected to keep UN measures in place for now

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China has banned imports from North Korea including iron ore in line with UN sanctions. Photo: AP

Published: 6:30pm, 19 Jul 2019Updated: 11:06pm, 19 Jul 2019

North Korea’s trade with China has again fallen sharply, taking the country’s overall foreign trade volume below US$3 billion for the first time since Kim Jong-un took power in 2011.

Trade with China totalled US$2.7 billion in 2018, down 48.2 per cent from a year earlier, according to a report from the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency on Friday.

But according to the report, “North Korea’s Foreign Trade Trend in 2018”, the country’s trade reliance on its communist neighbour reached a record high last year.

It said China accounted for 95.8 per cent of the total foreign trade in North Korea in 2018 – up by 1 percentage point from the previous year – with 80.2 per cent of exports and 97.2 per cent of imports.

That heavy reliance on China meant North Korea’s overall foreign trade, excluding inter-Korean trade, also shrank, for a second consecutive year. It was down by 48.8 per cent from 2017 to US$2.84 billion.

Russia, the country’s second biggest trading partner, accounts for just 1.2 per cent of North Korea’s total trade volume.