Finally, a North Korean manufacturing sector that's booming

Bronzes of the late leaders Kim Il Sung (left) and Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang. Photo / AP

In North Korea, there's no escaping the Kim family.

"Eternal President" Kim Il Sung continues to reign - according to North Korean lore - 21 years after his death.

His son, "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il, died in 2011 but lies in state with his father in a huge mausoleum the size of Buckingham Palace on the outskirts of Pyongyang.

And the grandson, "Great Successor" Kim Jong Un, is making sure none of his subjects forget about the family line - by strengthening the bizarre personality cult that the family has perpetuated the past 60 years.

The latest outlet for Kimism: new statues. The regime has been tearing down statues of Kim Il Sung around the country - an act that must require all sorts of hoopla since it's a treasonous offence to even place a newspaper with a photo of one of the Kims face down - and replacing them with huge new statues of Kim Senior and Kim Junior.

"This looks like part of Kim Jong Un's plan to solidify his hereditary succession, carry on his father's mantle," says Curtis Melvin, a North Korea researcher at the US-Korea Institute at SAIS, Johns Hopkins, who has studied the country's geography extensively using satellite imagery. He has noted the steady replacement of the statues over time, thanks to his remarkable knowledge of the country through Google Earth.

The first statue to go was the one of Kim Il Sung in the centre of Pyongyang that was the required first stop for all visiting delegations. There, visitors were given bouquets of flowers to place at Kim Il Sung's feet and expected to bow. But in 2012, after Kim Jong Il's death, it was removed and replaced with two statues, a new one, or at least extensively remoulded, of Kim Il Sung, with a brand new statue of Kim Jong Il next to him. But that statue, of the second Kim in a light coat, didn't last long, and was soon replaced by one of him in a heavier winter coat (like his dad). Both are thought to be about 20m tall and appear to be made of bronze.

Since then, the authorities have been methodically going around the country pulling down the statues of Kim Senior and replacing it with new likenesses of him and Kim Junior. This has been widely noted in North Korean media.

"The erection of the statues in the province is a noteworthy event in glorifying the revolutionary careers and feats of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il," the state-run Korea Central News Agency reported this week in Pyongsong. "In addition to the statues, there are Kim Il Sung/Kim Jong Il monuments going up across the country. I have counted 233 of those," Melvin says. At least there's one sector North Korea can say is really booming.

- Washington Post-Bloomberg