ON BRINGING ABOUT A REVOLUTIONARY
TURN IN LAND ADMINISTRATION
IN LINE WITH THE REQUIREMENTS OF
THE BUILDING OF A THRIVING SOCIALIST COUNTRY

Talk to Senior Officials of the Party and State Economic Organs and Working People’s Organizations

April 27, 2012          

KIM JONG UN     


    It is very significant that the Conference of Activists in the General Mobilization Movement for Land Administration is to be held in the period of revolutionary upsurge, when the entire Party, the whole army and all the people are accelerating the general march for the building of a thriving country and the improving of the people’s standard of living with the great dignity and pride in having celebrated the centenary of the birth of President Il Sung as the greatest revolutionary holiday and true to the spirit of the Fourth Conference of the Workers’ Party of Korea.
    The forthcoming Conference of Activists in the General Mobilization Movement for Land Administration should serve as an important occasion for defending and exalting the brilliance of the ideas of General Kim Jong Il on land administration and his imperishable exploits and for bringing about a revolutionary turn in land administration in line with the requirements of the building of a thriving socialist country.
    Land administration is a patriotic undertaking of lasting significance for achieving the prosperity of the country and a noble undertaking for creating excellent base of living for the people. When we perform this undertaking in a far-sighted way, we will be able to build our country, our motherland, into a thriving socialist country, into a people’s paradise, and hand down to the coming generations rich and beautiful rivers and mountains.
    President Kim Il Sung and General Kim Jong Il, peerless patriots and benevolent fathers of the people, always paid close attention to land administration and devoted painstaking efforts to developing the rivers and mountains of the country in an excellent way.
    Immediately after the liberation of the country, Comrade Kim Il Sung took a shovel in his hand to break ground first for the Pothong River improvement project and planted a tree on Munsu Hill, unfolding a long-term plan for land development; he then personally led the efforts for its realization.
    True to the noble intention of the President, General Kim Jong Il, saying that land administration is a patriotic undertaking for the prosperity of the country and the happiness of all the generations to come, clarified the orientation and ways for land development; in order to have the entire Party, the whole country and all the people actively participate in land administration, he initiated the general mobilization movement for land administration and energetically led it.
    Under his wise leadership and concern, monumental structures of lasting value have sprung up across the country, and streets and villages have been turned into socialist fairylands. The land under cultivation in the country has been realigned into large-sized, standardized fields as befits the land of socialist Korea, vast tidal flats have been reclaimed into arable land and solid material and technological foundations have been laid for covering the whole country with trees and flowers. Many scenic places and spots, like Mt. Kuwol, Mt. Chilbo, Ryongmun Cave and Songam Cavern, have been developed into pleasure grounds for the people, rivers improved in a neat way, and Youth Hero Motorway, Pukchong-Hyesan Road and other new roads built; thus, the land of the country have assumed a new appearance.
    These epochal changes that have taken place in land administration are entirely a brilliant fruition of the sagacious leadership of the General, who advanced far-reaching plans and original policies for all the realms of land administration and energetically led the efforts for their implementation. The exploits the General achieved in land administration to lay the basic foundations for the building of our country, our motherland, into a thriving one and turn it into a place, beautiful and good to live in, will shine forever in the history of our prospering socialist country.
    The proud successes achieved in land administration in the past days are associated with the feats of the officials and working people in the field of land administration, service personnel and people, who have worked devotedly to defend and implement the Party’s policy on land administration.
    Availing myself of this opportunity, I highly appreciate the feats officials, service personnel and people have performed in land administration and extend warm thanks to the participants in the Conference of Activists in the General Mobilization Movement for Land Administration and to other officials and working people in the sector of land administration and all the service personnel and people.
    Today the sector of land administration is faced with a heavy yet honourable task to bring about a revolutionary turn in its work in line with the requirements of the building of a thriving socialist country.
    Officials and working people in the sector of land administration should staunchly defend the General’s ideas on land administration and his leadership exploits, exalt their brilliance, and carry out his instructions without any vacillation and without an inch of concession, thus sprucing up the appearance of the land as befits that of a thriving socialist country. This is the general orientation and general task facing the sector of land administration.
    We should, first of all, develop Pyongyang into a sacred, revolutionary city equipped with a revolutionary outlook on the leader, into a majestic and picturesque world-class city.
    General Kim Jong Il stressed on several occasions that Pyongyang should be developed into a city permeated with the revolutionary outlook on the leader with the statue of President Kim Il Sung on Mansu Hill as the central axis. Developing Pyongyang, which is associated with the careers of the President and the General and where they are preserved in their lifetime appearances, into the capital of the revolution permeated with the revolutionary outlook on the leader is the revolutionary duty and noble moral obligation of our Party and our people.
    Greeting the centenary of the birth of the President, we set up on Mansu Hill statues of the President and the General with due respect as a reflection of the ardent desire and infinite loyalty of the people across the country. This is a source of the greatest glory and happiness of our people. As the statues were set up on Mansu Hill and its surrounding area has been developed in a magnificent and modern way, the architectural formation of Pyongyang has become wonderful with the statues as the central axis. We should be effective in afforestation and greening so as to better lay out the area of the statues and the Mansudae area.
    The area of the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun should be developed to lay it out as a solemn, supreme sanctuary of Juche. In the palace, President  Kim Il Sung and General Kim Jong Il are preserved in their lifetime appearances, living forever with us, and our people and the progressive people of the world, who are yearning for them, stream there continuously. We should plant at the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun and the Arboretum a greater number of various trees and beautiful flowering plants of the best species in the world and tend them with utmost care to cover them with thick forests; we should also lay out the park and green area well and thus add to the scenery of the palace.
    The Mangyongdae Revolutionary Site should be laid out in an excellent way. Mangyongdae is the place where Comrade Kim Il Sung, the great leader whom our people greeted for the first time in their 5 000-year-long history, was born and spent his childhood. It is the spiritual home of our people and the sanctuary of the sun and sacred place of the revolution dear to the hearts of the revolutionary peoples of the world. By better laying out Mangyongdae as befits the sanctuary of the sun, we should ensure that his great personality and exploits are handed down generation after generation and that the history of his revolutionary activities continues for all eternity on this land. We should take good care of the buildings and remains in the revolutionary site like his native home and the revolutionary museum, and afforest the place on the highest standard as befits the sanctuary of the sun.
    We should build up Pyongyang not only as a city imbued with the revolutionary outlook on the leader but also as a centre and paradigm of Songun culture, thereby ensuring that the culture created in Pyongyang spreads to provinces. If we spruce up the looks of the country by building up Pyongyang as an example and modelling local cities on it, we can turn the whole country into a socialist fairyland.
    Pyongyang should form streets and lay roads excellently, build dwelling houses, public buildings, catering establishments and other architectural structures in a characteristic way and take good care of them. We should turn the capital city of Pyongyang into a thickly wooded city, into a city in a park, by building parks and pleasure grounds excellently, creating more green areas and planting trees of good species and beautiful flowers. We should construct buildings, create green areas and plant flowers in our own refined and characteristic way as required by the national sentiments and modern aesthetic feelings.
    We should perfect decorative illumination of Pyongyang. As it has many monumental edifices like the Tower of the Juche Idea and the Arch of Triumph and large buildings like the Grand People’s Study House, the May Day Stadium and the high-rises in the Mansudae area, the city can be decorated nicely with illuminations. We should decorate the buildings and their surroundings in our own refined and graceful way so as to make the night view of Pyongyang more elegant and wonderful as befits the capital of a prosperous country.
    Provincial seats and other local cities and rural villages should be laid out in conformity with their characteristic features.
    Now provinces are not laid out well; their seats do not sustain their characteristics. The forms of dwelling houses and public buildings in Haeju in South Hwanghae Province, Sariwon in North Hwanghae Province and other provincial seats look much alike. It is apparently because, if the central authorities praised a structure, a nationwide demonstration lecture was organized about it and a standardized design was sent down to provinces for them to use in their construction. Dwelling houses in rural communities should be distinctive from locality to locality. However, they all look the same, be they in east or west coastal areas or in mountainous areas.
    Local cities and rural villages should be laid out in such a way that they set off the peculiar features and individualities of the localities concerned.
    Provinces should build up their construction forces and dynamically push ahead with urban and rural construction. They should preserve their own specific features in urban formation and give variety to the forms of structures. The central authorities should not control local construction too strictly, but allow provinces to construct buildings in conformity with their own specific features.
    When inspecting local areas, I have often seen bare land; wind may flick off dust there and it is not good to the eye, either. To plant trees, flowers and cover plants or create pastures everywhere, except the land under cultivation, so as to ensure that there is not an inch of land, bare or full of weeds-this is the intention of the Party. We should plant lawn grass and other cover plants in the urban and rural residential areas, along the railways and in the parks to leave no land bare.
    We should direct a great effort to managing and protecting land.
    Land is a basic means of agricultural production, the base of living for the people and a valuable asset of the country to be handed down to the coming generations. As our country has a limited area of land under cultivation, we should always be attentive to the managing and protecting of land.
    We should be effective in land protection, so as to prevent even an inch of it from being lost. As there have been floods for several years because of heavy rains in the rainy season, a considerable area of land under cultivation has caved in or been washed away. We should take thoroughgoing measures to cope with the rainy season, dredge river-beds and build up embankments to prevent the land under cultivation from caving in or being washed away.
    In order to build on this land a thriving socialist country true to the earnest instructions of General Kim Jong Il, we should solve, before anything else, the problem of food for the people; to this end, we should obtain arable land to the maximum and positively increase its area while increasing the unit-area yield of crops. The land that can be brought under cultivation can be found everywhere. A man, who strives to find reclaimable land and increase the area of the land under cultivation even by an inch, is a genuine patriot.
    We should continue to put a great effort on reclaiming tidal flats to expand the area of the land under cultivation. The tidal flats we are planning to reclaim amount to 300 000 hectares. We should give precedence to reclaiming those with good conditions for building embankments and prospects of being turned into arable land soon and to building networks of facilities there immediately afterwards to put them under cultivation. As the reclaiming of tidal flats is a huge and difficult undertaking for nature transformation, we should pay national concern to it and take thoroughgoing measures to ensure the supply of enough equipment and materials including lorries, fuel and cement.
    We should finish the remainder of the land realignment projects. The projects have been undertaken across the country under the leadership of General Kim Jong Il, but there are still patches of fields in the far corners of the countryside. Provinces should realign by themselves these unnoticeable patches splendidly and hand them down to posterity.
    The General said that, after completing the land realignment projects, the power poles scattered over the paddy and non-paddy fields should be relocated, but his instructions are yet to be carried out to the letter. True to his instructions, we should relocate the power poles standing in a disorderly way.
    We should make persevering efforts to ameliorate the soil conditions. Both paddy and non-paddy fields in our country were brought under cultivation long ago, and as a large proportion of them is located on slopes, rains have impoverished and acidified the soil by stripping them of nutrients. We should raise their fertility by improving their soil conditions. We should analyze the soil composition field by field, and, on this basis, carpet them with fresh soil, apply slaked lime or organic fertilizers to the fields and plant legumes there.
    We should establish strict order over the use of land to protect and make the most of it. It is necessary to register all the fields under cultivation with the state and prevent them from being left idle or encroached upon. When we are to build towns, villages, factories or roads, we should build them not in the fields under cultivation, but at the foot of mountains or in the fields that are not fit for cultivation. We should see to it that dwelling houses and public buildings in the arable land are moved to the foot of mountains or barren land. If we have to build a factory on the arable land, we should build it on the sterile part; we should save as much land as possible by locating shops, restaurants and other amenities on the lower storeys of buildings in urban construction. Strict discipline should be set up, whereby a building or factory is allowed to be constructed on the arable land only in return for substitute land.
    We should make good arrangements to plant trees and conserve forests to cover the country with trees and flowers.
    Forests in the mountains that account for nearly 80% of the country’s land are its most precious resources, the wealth to be handed down to posterity and a major means of protecting land.
    But afforestation and forest conservation are not on a proper track now. Many trees are planted every spring and autumn, but there is no marked improvement in the afforestation of the country. Many mountains in the country remain denuded of trees. In provinces there are not a few bare mountains even among the ones with the signboards, reading, “Forest Conservation,” “Youth Forest” and “Children’s Union Forest.” Measures of should be taken by the Party and the state to promote afforestation and forest conservation.
    We should make all the bare mountains thickly wooded in ten years by bringing about a radical improvement in afforestation and forest conservation. This is the unshakeable determination and will of our Party.
    Afforestation is a long-term project, so it should be undertaken under a far-reaching plan. We should draw up annual plans and a long-term plan clearly for afforestation on the basis of a scientific analysis of the state of the mountains, their geographical features and the local conditions, and carry them out without fail. Only then can we make the bare mountains thickly wooded in ten years as determined by the Party and further improve the administration of forests in a far-sighted way.
    It is the behests of the President and the General to turn all the mountains into those where we can pick “treasures,” “gold.” As instructed by them, we should undertake afforestation in the way of planting the species of trees that will be useful for economic construction and improving of people’s living standards-trees for timber production, oil-yielding trees, wild-fruit trees, chestnut trees and trees for pulp and paper production.
    We should give priority to growing saplings to carry on afforestation under a far-reaching plan. We cannot cover the country with trees in the way of transplanting those in the mountains. We should build nurseries in the capital and provinces and encourage them to introduce scientific, industrial and intensive methods of producing saplings. This will make it possible to ensure regular supply of many saplings that grow fast and are of great economic value, like Pinus strobus and Larix leptolepis that were highly appreciated by the General.
    Tree-planting should be done on the principle of planting the right trees on the right soil. We cannot increase the survival rate of saplings, however superior their species may be, nor can we grow them properly, if they are not provided with appropriate climatic and soil conditions that suit their biological characteristics. Therefore, we should plant trees on the principle of planting the right trees on the right soil after making a detailed analysis of the climatic and soil conditions of the relevant regions and areas, and plant needle- and broad-leaved trees in good harmony so as to create favourable conditions for their growth.
    Tree-planting should be undertaken as an all-people drive. The work of covering the mountains across the country with trees can be successful only through the efforts of all the people of the country. Every institution, enterprise, cooperative organization and school should be assigned an area and quota for tree-planting, and each and every one should be encouraged to turn out in the tree-planting seasons of spring and autumn. Particularly, youth league organizations and schools should make vigorous efforts to create Youth Forest and Children’s Union Forest. Officials should stand in the van of tree-planting. They should not confine themselves to planting a few trees each on the Arbor Day, but lead the people to plant trees with sincere care to meet the technical requirements by setting examples as they plant trees with them in their van in the tree-planting seasons of spring and autumn.
    We should plant trees and tend them with utmost care to increase their survival rate markedly. After planting trees with meticulous care according to technical regulations, it is necessary to take good care of them, watering them and removing grasses and shrubs around them so that all of them can survive and grow well.
    We should also direct great efforts to preserving and managing forests.
    Preventing forest fire is a prerequisite for preserving and managing forests. A forest fire reduces the valuable forest resources to ashes in an instant. We should educate people to observe set order and put strict demand on them before they climb a mountain lest the slightest risks of forest fire should occur. Provinces, cities and counties should establish a well-knit system of keeping watch for forest fire, raising signal of it and mobilizing the masses in case of a forest fire; we should also build fire belts according to regulations so that any forest fire can be put out in time and cannot spread further.
    In order to protect forests, we should decisively solve the people’s problem of firewood. If we fail to solve this problem, we cannot protect forests because trees may be cut down at random for firewood however many trees we may plant and grow. Provinces, cities and counties should find a decisive solution to the firewood problem by creating forests for firewood to make them pay off in practice, taking good care of them, ensuring that the factories, enterprises and cooperative farms operate their coal mines more efficiently, and widely introducing biogas. With the recent development of an active additive for ultra anthracite, good prospects have been opened for using ultra anthracite and bony coal in place of wood. This additive must be widely introduced everywhere.
    Damage of forests by pests should be thoroughly prevented. We should take measures for preventing such damage, control pests immediately and exhaustively once they break out, and wage an all-people pest control drive every March and May. It is also necessary to take measures to study and develop, produce and supply effective pesticides.
    We should intensify the work of water management, including river improvement.
    As our country abounds in water resources such as big and small rivers, lakes and reservoirs, we can satisfy the demand of the country and people for water, prevent damage from flooding and drought and develop the country’s landscape more nicely if we manage them properly.
    We should put efforts into river improvement projects to prevent flooding and create a good appearance of riverside areas. The damage from flooding in the rainy season is attributable mainly to the overflowing of rivers. Therefore, if we are to prevent the damage, we should regularly dredge river-beds so that water can flow away freely however heavy the rain may be, straighten winding water courses, build up embankments and form woodland along rivers. We should build embankments and sidewalks along rivers in urban areas in keeping with the modern trends, and turn their surroundings into parks, pleasure grounds and forests.
    We should build a large number of various structures such as dams and barrages on rivers and manage them scrupulously. If we build them on rivers and properly maintain irrigation waterways, including gravitational waterways, we can prevent damage from flooding and drought, make effective use of water, produce electricity, raise fish and add beauty to the landscape.
    We should take careful measures to prevent earth and sand from flowing into rivers and landslides from occurring. To this end, we should plant many trees along rivers and build stone terraces or buttresses where necessary.
    We should conduct road construction and management well.
    Road is the face of the country and one of the major criteria for judging the level of its economic development and civilization. Proper road construction and management will make it possible for us to develop the country’s economy, ensure people’s convenience in their living and transform the appearance of the country.
    We should channel efforts into road construction to perfect the overall road network of the country in a rational way and build up the roads to meet the modern, heavy-duty and high-speed purposes. A ring road should be built in Pyongyang, and a larger number of motorways and major roads constructed.
    A qualitative improvement should be made decisively in road construction. Methods of road construction should be further perfected, and the demands of technical regulations and building methods met to the full in the whole course, from roadbed construction to pavement.
    Construction of roads should be made specialized for the improvement of its quality. We should build up specialized road construction organs and their technical forces, so that they could take full responsibility for constructing and maintaining roads in conformity with the designs, technical regulations and construction methods. A radical increase should be brought about in the rate of mechanization in road construction. Those organs specializing in road construction should be amply provided with machinery and equipment, so that they could make the maximum use of them in constructing and maintaining roads.
    Roads should be upgraded technologically. Motorways, tourist roads and trunk roads should be renovated in conformity with their grades and technical regulations, and paved qualitatively. At the same time, the major roads should be expanded in width and wooden bridges replaced with concrete ones. In keeping with the topographical conditions of our country, which is mountainous, tunnels should be dug across mountain passes and ridges, and bridges built across valleys, thereby adjusting the alignment of roads and protecting natural environment. Safety bars should be set up on both sides of motorways to prevent accidents. Rotaries and median strips should be well designed for road safety and urban landscaping. It is advisable to decorate the rotaries, median strips and flower stands along roads with flowering plants and trees of our country, instead of those that are neither congenial to the taste of our people nor found in our country. Road signs, including direction signs, should be set up according to the established international standards.
    We should keep roads under regular repair and maintenance. If we fail to do so, they cannot remain durable and cultured. For proper maintenance of roads, it is necessary to establish a scientific and well-regulated system of repairing and maintaining roads at periodical intervals. Intensive care should be given to road repair particularly in the thawing days and in the days when the rainy season ends; the roads should be paved again and road structures and setups repaired, where necessary. Earth roads should be repaired in the way of levelling them, and roadsides, slopes and ditches kept in a good state of maintenance for the cultured aspect of roads. We should plant trees on the sides of all roads, including motorways and tourist roads, and make the areas surrounding them thick with trees and flowers. Snow ploughs should also be provided to the major roads for the timely removal of snow from them.
    Road repair and maintenance should be undertaken as a mass drive. We should assign factories, enterprises and all other units with sections of roads to establish a well-regulated, mass-based system of maintaining them. We should designate April and October as periods for intensive repair of roads, and ensure that all the people take an active part in the repairing and maintaining of roads out of patriotism and with the awareness of being masters.
    Railways of the country should be improved. We should constantly push forward the work of raising the intensity of railways. Pyongyang and North Phyongan Province are standing in the van of this work. Provinces, cities and counties should put steady stress on increasing the intensity of railways, and keep the railway stations and railway environment in fine arrangement. For the present, as the General instructed in his lifetime, the youth league and the youth shock brigade should complete the reconstruction of the northern railways in the shortest period and in a qualitative way.
    We should be efficient in the sea and coastal management.
    Efficient sea and coastal management is important in our country which is bounded on three sides by the sea and has many rivers, lakes and reservoirs. Only when we are efficient in the sea and coastal management can natural calamities be prevented, the appearance of the country improved, and aquatic resources conserved and increased.
    Efforts should be directed to building up the coasts. We should solidly build the various protection facilities on the coasts, like embankments, so as to prevent damage from the recurrent tidal waves and typhoons, regularly repair and maintain them, and create windbreaks in a far-sighted way.
    Along with this, the work for conserving aquatic resources should be done well. We should set the volume of aquatic production based on a scientific survey of their resources in all the water areas, and ensure that the quota is not exceeded on any account. We should exercise strict supervision and control to ensure that no organs are allowed to catch fish in the season when fishing is prohibited according to their species, catch fry or destroy their habitat by catching them by means of prohibited fishing implements and methods that may inflict damage to aquatic resources. Organs should actively perform the work of increasing aquatic resources, like building facilities for aquaculture, spreading stones at the bottom of water and releasing fry into the water areas under their charge.
    We should do a good job of environment and nature conservation.
    Environment and nature conservation is an important and responsible undertaking to make mountains and rivers of the country more beautiful, conserve and increase natural resources, protect people’s health and provide them with a better living environment. The more society develops, the higher the people’s demand for environment and nature conservation grows.
    What is important in environment conservation is to take thoroughgoing measures to prevent pollution. Pollution is a source of natural environment contamination and various diseases.
    In order to prevent pollution, air pollution should be prevented before anything else. Now some economic officials are not proactive in this undertaking, claiming that there are many technical problems to be solved and enormous funds are required if they were to remove harmful gases and dust released from factories and enterprises, including iron and steel works, smelteries, thermal power plants and chemical factories; this is a manifestation of their lack of the serve-the-people spirit. Factories and enterprises should provide the equipment and production lines that release dust with dust-arresting, airtight and ventilation devices, repair and maintain them at regular intervals, and upgrade them continuously. Factories that release harmful gases and dust in large quantities should be rearranged or moved to the areas outside cities and residential areas. Fallen tree leaves and garbage should be taken out from institutions, enterprises, streets, villages, parks, pleasure grounds, roads and the vicinity of railways to certain areas or used for producing manure; they should refrain from collecting them in any place and burning them, polluting the air.
    Pollution of rivers, lakes and seas should be prevented as well. For this, the industrial and city sewage from factories, enterprises and residential areas should be purified before being discharged. Factories, enterprises, cities and counties should build sewage treatment plants by taking into account the amount of industrial and city sewage and upgrade their equipment. In particular, mines should properly build sediment basins so as to prevent ore dust or waste water from flowing into rivers, lakes and seas. Water works, sewerage system and sewage treatment facilities should be built ahead of others in urban construction in accordance with the principle of giving priority to infrastructure over superstructure in construction, so as to prevent environmental pollution. The units that put seas and rivers into their use should have their ports, wharves, harbours and vessels fully equipped with facilities for treating sewage and garbage. An organic composite fertilizer factory has recently been built in Pyongyang; it produces quality organic fertilizer by comprehensively treating sludge from the Pothong River, sediment at the sewage treatment plants and slag. If such factories conducive to economic development and environment conservation are built, waste from factories and cities can be efficiently treated, thus preventing the environment from being polluted.
    Various factors, including the decrease of forest areas, are now contributing to destroying the ecological environment across the world; this is leading to the gradual decrease of the number of species of animals and plants, causing great anxiety among people. We should make a regular survey of the species and habitat conditions of the animals and plants that are found in mountains and river basins, and take proactive steps to protect the endangered, rare and other biological species and to preserve biodiversity. Meanwhile, we should properly define nature reserves, increase their area step by step, and eliminate such practices as setting up industrial buildings and facilities at random, exploiting underground and forest resources or killing wild animals in these areas.
    We should value the underground resources of the country and actively conserve them. Some people are now attempting to develop the valuable underground resources of the country at random on this or that excuse to export them for not a great sum of foreign exchange. This is an attitude lacking in far-sightedness and an expression of lack of patriotism. A rigid system should be established of screening and approving the development of underground resources of the country by the Ministry of State Natural Resources Development and the non-permanent Underground Resources Development Committee to ensure that unauthorized or disorderly exploitation of underground resources is not revealed.
    As land administration is a very wide-ranging, gigantic and protracted undertaking, we have to work out a scientific and reasonable master plan for land development if we are to bring about a revolutionary turn in this undertaking, and according to this, develop land in a far-sighted and planned way.
    Relevant sectors should establish contact among themselves to map out master plans for the whole country, main regions, provinces, cities and counties, taking into detailed and scientific account the climatic and soil conditions and natural resources in different regions and the prospects of the economic and cultural development of the country.
    The master plans for land development are a law of the state nobody can violate. The sector of land administration should establish strict discipline of undertaking land development and management according to the master plans. Provinces, cities and counties should undertake their construction, development and resources management in a responsible manner as required by the approved master-plans, and should not carry out construction, develop resources or destroy ecological environment in violation of the master plans.
    Land administration should be conducted dynamically as a campaign involving the entire Party, the whole country and all the people.
    In order to bring about a change in land administration, all the institutions, enterprises and cooperative farms and all the officials and people should be enlisted in this work. Party and working people’s organizations and people’s government organs should bring home to Party members and other working people the fact that land administration is a noble patriotic undertaking for the prosperity of their country, their motherland, and their own happiness, and thus ensure that they actively turn out in the work of laying out their native places with an attitude befitting masters.
    We should give clear-cut annual tasks of land development projects, like tree-planting and river and road improvement, to institutions, enterprises, cooperative farms and all other units, and make a strong demand on them to ensure that they carry out the tasks. Youth league organizations and educational institutes, like secondary schools, colleges and universities, should intensify ideological education among young people and students so that they would actively turn out in land administration, and include land administration in their curricula and implement them compulsorily.
    While inspecting the KPA units, General Kim Jong Il was most delighted when he saw their surroundings kept neat and tidy and thickly wooded. The units of the KPA should improve the roads and rivers and plant trees in large numbers in the areas where they are stationed.
    All the institutions, enterprises and cooperative farms and all the people should be enlisted in land administration during the general mobilization period for land administration. We should designate the period from November to March the following year as the period for protecting forests and underground resources, and from March to July as the period for protecting useful animals, and ensure that during these periods the entire Party, the whole country and all the people are involved in conserving the nature of the country.
    A brisk campaign should be conducted to win the title of a model county in land and environment protection. Cities and counties should vigorously wage this campaign under the slogan “Let us further improve the appearance of our mountains, our rivers and our own native places!” so as to effect a turn in land administration. Land administration and environment conservation should be carried out in close combination with the Three-Revolution Red Flag Movement and various other mass movements.
    It is important in land administration and environment conservation to enhance the sense of responsibility and role of the Ministry of Land and Environment Protection and other related organs, and government organs. As the central organ which has assumed before the Party and the state the responsibility for the overall land administration of the country, the Ministry of Land and Environment Protection should exercise unified control over all the work of land administration and responsibly organize and conduct it in keeping with the requirements of the Party’s policies and the state. Government organs should take in hand all the work of land administration within the regions under their charge and undertake it in a bold manner by mobilizing all the institutions, enterprises, cooperative organs and people.
    In order to push vigorously ahead with land administration as a Party-wide, nation-wide and all-people drive, it is imperative that the state provides supplies for it. Land administration is a nature-harnessing project that requires large amounts of equipment, materials and funds. The Cabinet, the State Planning Commission and other relevant organs should draw up plans for the equipment, materials and funds needed for land administration and environment protection across the country, and ensure their smooth and timely supply.
    Mass media should widely explain and disseminate the Party’s policies, scientific and technological information and common knowledge related with land administration and environment conservation through newspapers, periodicals, the radio and TV so as to heighten social interest in it.
    Science and technology related with land administration should rapidly be developed.
    Scientific research institutions in the sector of land administration and environment conservation should dynamically conduct scientific research in line with the requirements of the building of a thriving country, so as to fully solve in time and on a high standard the scientific and technological problems arising in land administration and environment conservation. In particular, they should direct efforts to the scientific research geared to putting land protection, afforestation and road and river improvement on a scientific and modern basis and preventing air and water pollution. The sector of land administration and environment conservation should organize scientific and technological forums on a regular basis and publish more scientific and technological books and periodicals, thus giving a strong impetus to the development of science and technology in this sector.
    We should briskly conduct scientific and technological exchanges with other countries and international organizations. In the sector of land administration and environment conservation there are many things to be introduced from among the world trends and foreign countries’ advanced technologies. As I said before, we should encourage access to the world trends and advanced technologies of foreign countries through the Internet and send delegations to foreign countries so that they can learn necessary things from them and collect materials. The Ministry of Land and Environment Protection and relevant organs should briskly conduct joint research and academic and information exchanges with scientific research institutions of other countries and participate in international conferences and seminars, so as to positively introduce the advanced science and technology.
    We should firmly build up the ranks of scientists and technicians in the sector of land administration and environment conservation, provide them with sufficient conditions for scientific research and adopt positive measures to introduce the scientific and technological achievements into production and construction in time.
    Supervision and control over land administration and environment conservation should be intensified.
    The organs of land and environment protection and supervisory institutions should regularly supervise and control every sector or unit over its implementation of the Party’s policies on land administration and environment conservation and their observance of laws and regulations, and further intensify legal control over illegal practices. As far as land administration and environment conservation are concerned, there can be no exception; any sector or any unit should be placed under the control of the state. We should review all the laws and regulations concerning land administration and environment conservation, and amend or supplement them as required by the developing reality, so as to intensify supervision and control over this work.
    Party guidance over land administration should be strengthened.
    Party organizations should vigorously enlist Party members and other working people in land administration and environment conservation.
    Land administration can bear rich fruits only when the unlimited creative power of the masses of the people is enlisted to the full. Party organizations should create an atmosphere of general mobilization for land administration throughout society and conduct vigorous organizational and political work to see to it that all Party members and other working people actively turn out in this effort.
    Senior Party officials, including chief secretaries of provincial, city and county Party committees, should take tree-planting, river improvement and road administration under their direct charge and give them Party-oriented guidance. In particular, every city or county chief Party secretary, who takes responsibility for the one 200th of the country, should be always mindful of the fact that proper land administration in his or her city or county will help towards the overall land administration of the country, and launch a bold drive to change the appearance of the country in the spirit of blazing the trail. The appearance of a city or county is a criterion with which to judge the sense of responsibility and ability of its chief Party secretary.
    By holding fast to the Party’s policies on land administration, Party organizations should regularly acquaint themselves with the implementation of the policies, review it and give new tasks to give a Party-oriented impetus and assistance to their full implementation.
    The relevant department of the Party Central Committee should strictly control and guide the general mobilization drive for land administration in spring and autumn to ensure that it is conducted briskly, and the Party and the state should properly review the drive and evaluate its results every year. Provincial, city and county Party committees and Party organizations at the relevant ministries and central agencies should also review the problems arising in the utilization of forest and aquatic resources and the exploitation of underground resources, and take relevant measures during the annual review of the spring and autumn general mobilization drive for land administration. Negligence of land administration and environment conservation and failure to take an active part in this work should be viewed as ideological faults resulting from lack of patriotism, and be made a grave issue of.
    Party organizations should build up the ranks of officials in the sector of land administration and environment conservation. Success or failure in land administration and environment conservation depends largely on how the ranks of officials in this sector, the direct undertakers, are built up and how their role is enhanced. Party organizations should build up the ranks with competent persons who are faithful to the Party, staunchly patriotic and possessed of specialized technical knowledge, and lead them well so that they would keep to their revolutionary posts entrusted by the Party and fulfil their responsibility and role.
    Our Party attaches great importance to land administration and environment conservation, and demands that the whole Party, the entire army and all the people conduct the general mobilization movement for land administration more energetically so as to spruce up the appearance of the country as befits a thriving country and make active contributions to the building of an economic power and the improving of the people’s living standards.
    All the officials including those in the sector of land and environment protection and other people should firmly defend and exalt the brilliance of the ideas of President Kim Il Sung and General Kim Jong Il on land development and their exploits, and vigorously step up the building of a thriving socialist country by fanning the flames of the general mobilization movement for land administration with burning loyalty to the Party and ardent patriotism.