Sacks of dried night soil

North Korean households receive heavy yearly scrap collection quotas as new year begins

Those unable to gather recyclables on time must pay cash equivalents, and quotas are sometimes raised arbitrarily, leaving North Koreans feeling "shackled" by collection demands

North Korean neighborhood watch unit leaders have given households their yearly quotas for various scrap materials they are supposed to collect for the government...

According to the source, one neighborhood watch unit in Chongjin provided the following quotas to each household in a meeting on the evening of Jan. 14: 40 kilograms of scrap metal, 10 kilograms of scrap paper, 5 kilograms of scrap rubber, 2 kilograms of oil crops, and three 25-kilogram sacks of dried night soil.

There are many observations a chap could make about sacks of night soil, but I'll resist the temptation for now.  

In other news, I see Lord Mandelson has resigned from the Labour Party.