The freighter that will bear tons of food, fertilizer, and medical supplies from United Methodist and other donors to famine victims in North Korea will steam out of Houston harbor in mid-December and arrive sometime in February.

The 340-foot vessel, the Spirit of Grace, was to have left for North Korea in the first week of December, said Jesse Stokely, the United Methodist businessman who heads the relief shipment project. Instead, Stokely said, the Grace will first take an emergency shipment to Honduras to help victims of Hurricane Mitch.

"We felt that since the ship was in port empty, a few extra days wouldn't hurt it," Stokely said. "But we don't want to take our emphasis off of North Korea," Stokely said. "We can load that ship in four days."

The project to ship supplies to North Korea was started by United Methodists within the Texas Annual Conference and has been joined by various Christian denominations through the Christian Alliance for Humanitarian Aid, Inc., which Stokely heads.

Meanwhile, plans for the ship's North Korea cargo have changed to allow for a much bigger quantity of seeds and fertilizer. The Grace will be loaded with 80,000 zip-lock plastic bags--each containing 10 packets of much-needed seed. Tomato, cabbage, and corn are among the seed types to be shipped.

To match the seed supply, the Grace will also take on 80,000 bags of fertilizer, each weighing 50 pounds. That expands the fertilizer load to 4 million pounds, up from the originally planned 1 million or 1.5 million, Stokely said. The fertilizer, along with the seeds and a supply of plant food, is even more urgently needed in North Korea than the food that will also be aboard the Grace.

"We felt the plant food and the seeds are much more needed for the long-run to help them grow their crops," Stokely said. "The fertilizer and seeds are going to help them be more self-sufficient."

United States officials estimate that famine has killed between 900,000 and 2.4 million people in the last three years. The famine set in after severe floods and drought ravaged the country for three straight years, beginning in 1995. The General Board of Global Ministries (GBGM) has been aiding North Korea since 1996.

To make room for the fertilizer, the Grace will carry a smaller shipment of food boxes than originally planned, 60,000 instead of 150,000, Stokely said. Each 40-pound box will contain 20 pounds of rice, quantities of powdered milk, cans of meat, fish, or pork, canned vegetables and soups, and one pound of hard candies.

But the reduced number of boxes will not hurt the effort to help the famine victims, Stokely said, because it will be offset by the large amounts of wheat and other foodstuffs being sent through a separate effort of the United States government.

To meet the medical needs created by the famine, the Grace will carry 13 steel containers of medical supplies, medicines, dried soups, dried potatoes, other dried foods, vitamins, and an electrolyte drink that helps counter the effects of dehydration, Stokely said. A container will be trucked to each of North Korea's provincial orphanages, and each load should last several months.

Current plans call for the Grace to unload its cargo at the North Korean port of Chongjin. But planners are awaiting word from the North Korean authorities who have final say as to which port they will allow the ship to use. The Grace's North Korea cargo is currently being stockpiled at Port Jacinto, at the Port of Houston.

November 19, 1998

Stokely is a member of First United Methodist Church, Houston, whose pastor, the Reverend William H. Hinson, was part of a GBGM team that visited North Korea earlier this year.