North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has been pushing for economic development since he came to power several years ago.
And as North Korea prepares to celebrate the 70th anniversary of its foundation on Sunday with a series of military parades and performances, our Cha Sang-mi takes a look at the state of the North Korean economy.
This upcoming Sunday, September 9th, is no ordinary day for North Korea.
It's when Pyongyang celebrates the seventieth anniversary of the founding of North Korea's regime with extravagant military parades and acrobatic performances.
While much is known about the North's weaponry and nuclear programs, not much has been revealed about its economic conditions.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has stepped up his push for economic development this year,.. making appearances on the global stage through summits with Seoul and Washington.
These red dots on the map here, according to a report from the CSIS, are the locations of markets across the North -- at least 436 officially sanctioned markets altogether.
There have been major economic transitions since the young Kim came to power.
Once reliant on a centrally-planned economy, now the regime is turning a blind eye to the transition to a semi-legal market economy, yet still heavily regulated.
People's reliance on the markets depends on whether they live in a rural or urban area.
"There's a geographic difference to this, but many North Koreans living along the border with China depend on the market for their entire livelihoods, whereas people in Pyongyang, the capital city of North Korea, which is well supplied with goods, don't depend on the market so much."
In fact, a poll conducted by the Institute for Peace and Unification Studies on some one-hundred-and-50 defectors to the South says that 95 percent of them had purchased daily necessities from such markets in their neighborhood.
"Any North Korean can sell private or imported goods. There is at least one person in a household who sell things at these markets. It's a must, considering this is the only way they can sustain themselves."
Kang Mi-jin, a North Korean defector who works as a reporter at the Seoul-based Daily NK online newspaper, says that these markets sell everything, from beans to cosmetics.
As for the financial market, Kang says it is thriving for a select few.
"There are no national loans, but a lot of private moneylenders. A group of three or four women wandering around in beautiful clothes and bags are those who earn money from lending. They are quite powerful as they can even control the exchange rate through their talks."
Kang says that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is likely to highlight the economic achievements of his regime in his Foundation Day speech -- how North Korean-made food products outperformed Chinese products, how more shoes and socks are being made in the North, as well as how North Korea's IT sector is thriving.
Cha Sang-mi, Arirang News.
