Farmers from South Korea's North Jeolla Province, in the country's southwest, are protesting trade sanctions on the socialist DPRK that prevent them from sending material aid to farmers there. A collective of farmers and civic groups converged on the provincial office in Jeonju on Tuesday to demand the sanctions be lifted and that such cross-border relationships as trade at the DPRK's Kaesong Industrial Complex and tourism to Mt. Kumgang be allowed to resume according to the Panmunjom Declaration made last April, reported the South Korean daily Hankyoreh.

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While the note says Pyongyang will "strive to ensure food security by concentrating its efforts on farming to increase the output of early-ripening crops and the production of basic crops for the immediate future," it makes clear that food aid is needed "urgently" and says whatever plans diplomats made "must be realized during April," NK News reported.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization warned in February, "There is a food gap of about 1.4 million tons expected for 2019, and that's crops including rice, wheat, potato and soybeans," UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said, Sputnik reported, noting that crop yields were expected to be 10 percent less than last year.

Kim recently arrived in the Russian city of Vladivostok to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and is expected to appeal for food aid. AP reported Kim will also press Putin to take a stronger stance against UN economic sanctions on DPRK.

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Moscow has already sent 2,092 tons of wheat this year via the World Food Program, according to Korea Central News Agency. However, Russian lawmaker Konstantin Kosachev told Interfax in February the country would be sending the DPRK 50,000 tons of wheat aid.

Analyst Cho Bong-hyun of Seoul's IBK Economic Research Institute told AP Wednesday that DPRK will need more than 1 million tons of food aid this year.

Story by Morgan Artyukhina