North Korean leader Kim Jong Un raised fears he was preparing for war this year when he renounced the country’s commitment to peaceful reunification with the south. But since then, North Korea’s armed forces have had a more prosaic task: making good on the 40-year-old leader’s promise to build a factory in each of the country’s 200 counties and cities over the next 10 years.

“The overall regional economy is in a terrible situation,” Kim told the country’s rubber stamp parliament in January as he acknowledged his own “failure to provide the people in local areas with basic living necessities”.

With many of North Korea’s existing factories already running under capacity, experts are sceptical that the regime’s latest development initiative — the regional development 20x10 policy — will bear fruit.