15 fascinating facts about North Korea

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Everyone has heard a thing or two about North Korea.

The country frequently makes headlines, with recent notable examples such as its support of Donald Trump and its claims about planning to travel to the moon.

But some of its actions aren't quite so benign, including the recent firing of ballistic missiles into the sea.

The rest of the world has become increasingly responsive to the country's more threatening actions. In July, the US agreed to equip South Korea with its most advanced missile defense system. A month later, Japan ordered its military to be ready at any time to shoot down North Korean missiles.

No one seems to know what North Korea will do next or what's actually going on inside the country, as data isn't readily available or reliable. But there are some strange statistics and fun facts that lend perspective to the Hermit Kingdom.

“Analysis of escapees from North Korea shows that those born after the Korean War in the late 1950s were on average about 2 inches shorter than South Koreans,” USA Today reported in 2013.

Last year, North Korea created its own time zone, called Pyongyang Time, named after the North Korean capital, which is 30 minutes behind South Korea and Japan.

The country started using Pyongyang Time on August 15, 2015, to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japan. Pyongyang Time was the time zone used before Japanese rule.

“A source from Pyongyang” told South Korea's The Chosun Ilbo that authorities issued an order requiring men to keep their hair no longer than 2 centimeters and requiring women to keep their hair at a bob length.

The men were told to model their hairstyle on Kim Jong Un, whose haircut is known as “ambitious” in North Korea (and terrible everywhere else). Women were advised to copy his wife.

Since Kim Jong Un took power, it has gotten more expensive to defect from the hermit kingdom.

It cost about $8,000 to get to China last year, which is far more than the average North Korean can afford, considering the gross domestic product per capita was estimated to be $1,800 in 2014.

Kim Jong Il's annual cognac expense was about 500 times the average North Korean's annual income.

Kim Jong Il, the father of Kim Jong Un, reportedly spent £700,000 on Hennessy each year. That's about $913,000 at today's exchange rate; Kim Jong Il died in 2011.

The average annual income in North Korea according to a 2013 estimate, is thought be $1,000 to $2,000.

Bill Gates' net worth at the time of publication was estimated at $78.2 billion.

Trading economics estimates North Korea's gross domestic product to be $17.4 billion. (The World Bank does not list an official figure.)

The population of Pyongyang is 2.863 million, according to 2015 estimates.

That figure would bump Houston, which had an estimated 2015 population of 2.3 million, down to fifth place.

But it still lost, 2-1.

Pennsylvania is 46,054 square miles, or 119,279 square kilometers.

North Korea is 120,538 square kilometers.

... but less than 20% of its land is arable. That's about the size of New Hampshire's land area.

Only 19.5% of North Korea's land is arable, which amounts to about 9,000 square miles.

New Hampshire's land area is 8,953 square miles.

The CIA World Factbook defines literate people as those ages 15 and over who can read and write.

North Korea has self-reported its literacy rate as 100% for both men and women.

There are 25,554 kilometers of roads in North Korea, but only 724 kilometers are paved. That's only 2.83% of all roadways.

In fact, while all of North Korea's roads could circle Pluto 3 1/2 times, the paved roads alone would cover only the distance between New York and Cleveland.

The circumference of Pluto is 7,445 kilometers, which means you could wrap North Korea's 25,554 kilometers of roads around it over three times.

At $132,100, Qatar's GDP per capita was the highest in the world in 2015.

North Korea's 2014 estimated GDP per capita was $1,800.

According to the 2015 Corruption Perceptions Index, North Korea and Somalia are tied for the title of the most corrupt nation.

Scores between zero (highly corrupt) and 100 (very clean) were given to 174 countries and territories.

North Korea scored an 8.

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Read the original article on Business Insider UK. © 2016. Follow Business Insider UK on Twitter.