Those who travel to North Korea regularly might have noticed that the last couple of years have brought significant improvement in the country’s economic situation. Newly built high-rise apartments, modern cars on the roads and improved infrastructure come as a surprise to visitors. It begs the question, where does Pyongyang get the money from?

The ambitious rocket and nuclear programs, which North Korea continues to pursue despite international condemnation, are expensive and harmful to its economy. International sanctions continue to bite the DPRK’s foreign trade and investment prospects. Regular floods and droughts, animal epidemics and other natural disasters hit the fragile economy even harder.

According to expert estimations, the DPRK should have ceased to exist in the mid-1990s, after the Communist bloc collapsed and Kim Il-sung died. But North Korea has fully recovered after the famine and even shows steady signs of economic growth.

Foreign critics looked everywhere with hope to unravel the mystery. After 2008 the stalled inter-Korean cooperation left North Korea without South Korean financial assistance. Western humanitarian aid has also been exhausted or reduced to a number of goods with little market value.

Although the volume of North Korea’s foreign trade is negligible, the domestic economic situation continues to improve. Pyongyang is routinely suspected of violating international sanctions by trading arms, smuggling drugs, counterfeiting U.S. dollars and other crimes.

These activities would be expected to refill the impoverished state with badly needed foreign exchange. However, anti-proliferation operations and bank account arrests have never disclosed anything criminal nor did they manage to answer the main question: where does the money come from?

In fact, North Korea is sitting on the goldmine. The northern side of the Korean peninsula is well known for its rocky terrain with 85 percent of the country composed of mountains. It hosts sizeable deposits of more than 200 different minerals, of which deposits of coal, iron ore, magnesite, gold ore, zinc ore, copper ore, limestone, molybdenum, and graphite are the largest and have the potential for the development of large-scale mines.

After China, North Korea’s magnesite reserves are the second largest in the world, and its tungsten deposits are almost the sixth-largest in the world.

Still the value of all these resources pales in comparison to prospects which promise the exploration and export of rare earth metals.

Rare earth metals are a group of 17 elements which are found in the earth’s crust. They are essential in the manufacture of high-tech products and in green technologies, such as wind turbines, solar panels or hybrid cars. Known as “the vitamins of high-tech industries,” REMs are minerals necessary for making everything that we use on a daily basis, like smartphones, LCDs, and notebook computers.

Some rare earth metals, such as cerium and neodymium, are crucial elements in semiconductors, cars, computers and other advanced technological areas. Other types of REMs can be used to build tanks and airplanes, missiles and lasers.

South Korea estimates the total value of the North’s mineral deposits at more than $6 trillion. Not surprisingly, despite high political and security tensions Seoul is showing a growing interest in developing REMs together with Pyongyang. In 2011, after receiving permission from the Ministry of Unification, officials from Korea Resources Corp. visited North Korea twice to study the condition of a graphite mine.

Together with their counterparts from the DPRK’s National Economic Cooperation Federation they had working-level talks at the Gaeseong Industrial Complex on jointly digging up REMs in North Korea. An analysis of samples obtained in North Korea showed that the type of rare earth metals could be useful for manufacturing LCD panels and optical lenses.

The joint report also revealed that there are large deposits of high-grade REMs in the western and eastern parts of North Korea, where prospecting work and mining have already begun.

It also reported that a number of the rare earth elements are being studied in scientific institutes, while some of the research findings have already been introduced in economic sectors. The North built a REM reprocessing plant in Hamhung in the 1990s but has been unable to put the plant into full operation due to power and supply bottlenecks.

Rare earth minerals are becoming increasingly expensive, as China, the world’s largest rare earth supplier, puts limits on its output and exports. In February China’s exports of rare earth metals exceeded the price of $1 million per ton, a nearly 900 percent increase in prices from the preceding year. China, which controls more than 95 percent of global production of rare earth metals, has an estimated 55 million tons in REM deposits.

North Korea has up to 20 million tons of REM deposits, but does not have the technology to explore its reserves or to produce goods for the high-tech industry. Nevertheless, in 2009 the DPRK’s exports of rare metals to China stood at $16 million, and as long as someone invests, exports will continue to expand.

This growing rise in REM prices and strong demand gives the young leader Kim Jong-un a good chance to improve the economic standing of North Korea without actually reforming its economy. Following the Gulf states’ and Russian example of catching the wind of rising oil prices in their sails, Pyongyang is likely to follow suit; becoming rich and powerful through the exploration and sale of natural resources.

The export of rare earth metals will replenish the state coffers; stimulate the loyalty of the elites to Kim Jong-un’s autocratic rule; and secure the growth of consumption among the ordinary people. Relations with South Korea, China and Japan are also likely to improve due to the large scale cooperation on exploring, processing and utilising REMs ― the mineral of the 21st century.

Pyongyang needs international assistance through joint projects to explore its mineral resources, and mainly its rare metal and rare earth minerals. North Korean and Chinese teams have been cooperating to explore mineral resources in the DPRK for many decades.

Seoul has recently expressed interest in working with Pyongyang on mining projects and technological innovations. Perhaps, Japan and Taiwan, who look for alternative REM supplies for their micro-processor and other cutting edge industries, might also decide to contribute to the development of this economically promising venture.

Paradoxically, the promise of Kim Jong-Il might soon come true and North Korea may become a “rich and prosperous state” ― rich in natural resources and empowered by nuclear technologies. In that case, North Korea might not even need to go through a painful and potentially destabilising economic reform.

Although the political regime will remain dictatorial, the idea of unification with the South by war or absorption will soon become meaningless. The purges of political elites and the mass starving of ordinary people in North Korea will cease. Gradually the level of prosperity in the two halves of the divided Korea will start equalising, opening more opportunities for greater exchange and cooperation. 

By Leonid Petrov

Leonid Petrov is a lecturer at the University of Sydney’s Department of Korean Studies. ― Ed.