Photo/Illutration A file image of a missile launch by North Korea is shown on a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul on Sept. 25. (AP Photo)

SEOUL--North Korea has poured up to $1.6 billion (about 231.2 billion yen) into its nuclear development program over the last 50 years, an estimate by a South Korean think tank showed.

It is equivalent to the amount that can cover the country’s food shortages for four years, according to the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA), which crunched the numbers.

Shin Won-sik, a South Korean lawmaker from the ruling People Power Party, provided The Asahi Shimbun on Sept. 27 with some of the data from a report he received from the KIDA, which is affiliated with South Korea’s National Defense Ministry.

The KIDA referred to other nuclear states’ spending when calculating how much North Korea has spent on its nuclear program since 1970, when it began nuclear development.

The institute estimates $600 million to $700 million was spent to cover the costs of constructing a nuclear fuel fabrication plant, nuclear reactors, a spent-fuel reprocessing facility and other related buildings in Yongbyon.

An estimated $200 million to $400 million was spent on producing highly enriched uranium, while $150 million to $220 million was likely used to build its nuclear arsenal.

At the eighth congress of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea in January last year, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un expressed his intention to continue nuclear development to make smaller nuclear weapons and those with multiple warheads.

To achieve that, North Korea would need to conduct at least four more nuclear tests, which would cost the country an additional $440 million to $640 million, according to a KIDA estimate.

North Korea has reportedly been suffering from a chronic shortage of food. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization reported in 2021 that an estimated 860,000 tons of food are still annually needed in the country.

That means the $1.1 billion to $1.6 billion North Korea has spent on nuclear development could have been used to make up for the rice deficiency for one and a half to two years or corn for three to four years, the KIDA’s estimate showed.

Kim reiterated his willingness to continue nuclear development at the Sept. 8 session of the Supreme People’s Assembly. The assembly also passed a law stipulating the conditions for using nuclear weapons.

The United States and South Korea continue to closely monitor developments in North Korea’s nuclear program, believing the country is ready to conduct its seventh nuclear test at any time.

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