2 Koreas, China to cooperate in reforestation of N. Korea

Climate organizations of the two Koreas and China have agreed to cooperate for the forestation of North Korea and other parts of Asia.

The Climate Change Center of Korea said Friday it signed a pact with Korea University and the Northeast Asia Foundation for Education & Culture and North Korea`s Pyongyang University of Science and Technology to set up the Green Asia Organization (GAO). Three South Korean non-governmental organizations for forestation also participated in the pact. In August, China`s Yanbian University agreed to participate in the launch of the GAO at a joint workshop with the Climate Change Center, which is scheduled to be established next year involving government organizations, civic groups, corporations and scholars.

"South Korea is the only country in the world that has succeeded in artificial forestation since the World War II," said Goh Kun, honorary president of the Climate Change Center and former South Korean prime minister, at a pact-signing ceremony. "Tapping our experiences to make North Korea`s barren mountains green again is a meaningful project to restore the ecology of Korean mountains and complete a `green Korea`."

Kim Chin-kyung, president of Pyongyang University of Science and Technology who has a U.S. citizenship, stressed that it was imperative to plant trees in North Korea, where mountains are becoming barren across the country. Kwon Byong-hyun, former South Korean ambassador to China, expressed concern that North Korea`s ongoing desertification is "more threatening than nuclear weapons or missiles."

Yoon Young-kyoon, head of the state-funded Korea Forest Research Institute, stressed the urgency of the reforestation of North Korea, noting that if delayed, the cost for the reforestation would increase exponentially. Kim So-hee, a secretary-general of the Climate Change Center who recently met with North Korea officials in Beijing, said the North expressed a strong will to cooperate, adding Pyongyang revised its law governing forests and set up a bureau for forests and agriculture.