 In different parts of the world, food production is suffering due to extreme weather events and prices are skyrocketing. Why is this happening and what will be the implications? The National Union of Real Maritime and Transport Workers in the UK has been actively organizing against the government's plan to shut down rail ticket offices. Why are the closures being opposed? South Korea's Conservative administration is planning to relocate statues of important independent fighters currently placed at the Korean military academy. Who are these fighters and why is there a controversy around them? This is the Daily Debrief. These are our stories for the day and before you go any further, if you are watching this on YouTube, don't forget to hit that subscribe button. India's record low monsoons have taken a toll on crop production, including that of rice. India is otherwise the biggest rice exporter in the world, but now the country has banned most of its rice exports. Another weather in Australia has cast a pall on wheat production. Production of other essential crops such as soybean, palm oil and corn is also expected to take a hit. All of this can have serious implications for food security as well as hunger which is already on the rise. To find out more on why this is happening, we go to D. Raghunandan from the Delhi Science Forum. So, Raghunandan, huge rainfall deficits are being cited as the reason behind this fall in crop production which includes wheat and rice and many climate experts are saying that this is because of El Nino, but some are also saying that this is a confluence of climate change and El Nino. Can you tell us what is happening? So, let me first explain globally the changes in climate patterns and particularly with regard to rainfall and what is the El Nino phenomenon. There are two phenomena related phenomena in the Pacific Ocean which are changes in the patterns of ocean currents and their temperatures and these reflect large scale climate phenomena which are not perhaps global but spread over large parts of the world, large regions of the world if you like. Now, El Nino and its counterpart La Nina which is the female version, the baby are changes in temperatures of these ocean currents El Nino where it gets warmer and La Nina when the temperature drops and when this phenomenon happens either way then it influences rainfall patterns across regions and parts of the world and usually El Nino is associated with rainfall less than normal and La Nina is associated with extreme with excess rainfall but then with climate change added on to this then the excess rainfall may sit on top of the extreme rainfall events that we are used to from climate change and El Nino may counter the extreme rainfall events and result in drops. Now, if you look at what is happening in India today with regard to La Nina this we have had two to three years of continuous La Nina activities in the Southern Pacific Ocean. This year we have had an El Nino coming in towards the latter half of the monsoon period and it was widely expected that this would result in below normal rainfall in the subcontinent. However, what has happened is because of the overlay of El Nino and climate change what has happened is as I was telling you we have had in India excess rainfall in the northern parts of the country and shortfall in the monsoon rains in peninsular India particularly over southern Maharashtra, Karnataka, parts of Tamil Nadu etc. Now there is one more phenomenon that has happened which has influenced rainfall patterns in the subcontinent this year and that is the tropical cyclones on the Arabian Sea. Now what has happened is the latest tropical cyclone on the Arabian over the Arabian Sea was expected to hit the southern part of the country but started drifting northwards towards Bombay, Karachi, the Bay area and along with it it then drags low pressure zones. There is already heat accumulating in northern India because of the normal summer etc. So you have dry air on top but you have cyclone coming up bringing with it moisture. This moisture accumulates, the heat conditions also evaporates water faster. So the dry upper atmosphere accumulates a huge amount of water and then when it encounters the appropriate weather conditions it pours which is why you have had these huge rains over Himachal, Uttarakhand etc. and earlier on from the cyclone of course you had the rains over Pakistan etc. So as I was saying this is a combination of several factors. It is a combination of El Nino, it is a combination of the tropical cyclone over the Arabian Sea which itself by the way is a rather recent phenomena of increased number of cyclones in the Arabian Sea which may be ascribed to climate change. So you have got the cyclone, you have got El Nino and you have got a weather pattern of extreme heat which is drawing water up into the atmosphere storing it and then coming down like that. So in coming back to the subject of food grain production it is expected and is a long-term prediction under climate change. IPCC's fifth assessment report, sixth assessment report have all projected that the Indian subcontinent will suffer from a drop of food grain production particularly wheat and rice. It is looking as if it may affect rice more than wheat but these are early days yet we still do not have sufficient statistical evidence to show which way it is going to go because there are so many regional variations over India. But it does look as if there is going to be a drop in crop production. One small point I would like to add is the concern is not only about drop in crop production. The changes in rainfall pattern the changes in temperature patterns particularly the not so cold winters and slightly higher daytime temperatures during the winter season. These are likely to result not only in lower crop output but also in the protein composition of the crop. So you may get nice looking wheat but if you examine it you will find that the protein content has dropped. So this is likely to result not only in drop of productivity of wheat but also drop in the nutritional quality of the wheat or rice that we obtain as a result of climate change. But as I said not all the data is in we will have to observe what happens over the next five to 10 years and along with regional variations then we may get a better picture. Over the past year the RMT or the National Union of Rail Maritime and Transport workers in the UK has been campaigning against the plans of the government and train companies to shut down all 1000 ticket offices across the country. The union says that while the government is trying to sell this as modernization it is actually an attempt to further de-staff railway stations. Public consultations on this move will end on September 1st and right before this the RMT has called for a march to 10 Downing Street to save ticket offices. Let's go to Anish for more on this story. So Anish can you start by telling us how does the government and these railway companies stand to benefit from this move of closing real ticket offices and why is the RMT opposing it? Well like the closure of rail ticketing offices as a government and obviously the private contractors who are running the railways at the moment the argument for them is that it is primarily because of how the behavior of customers of buying tickets or passengers of buying tickets have changed over time and how most people about like more than 90% in many places have chosen online or automatic ticketing systems and machines and favoring that over rail tickets. So sorry ticket encounters and that this is only the small number that it's being catered to and so for them it is unprofitable but the problem is that they speak as of the most of these railway ticket encounters run like 24-7 all through the day that's not how it works they pretty much run for a few couple of hours at least especially in small count country railway stations they pretty much run for just a couple of hours a day and it mostly benefits senior citizens and people with disabilities. So this closure of this depend to close down about more than 1,000 ticketing offices is something that is going to pretty much push out these people the most vulnerable passengers who still depend on railways more than any other modes of public transport and for whom railways continues to be the most accessible form of transport being completely left out in the cold and obviously job losses running into hundreds maybe in thousands for a whole lot of people and that is something and with no replacement there's no pay package there's no severance package no replacement or even attempt to absorb these people who lose jobs by the closure of these railway ticketing offices and counters and that is something that pretty much affects not just the workers but also passengers now this is something that RMT has brought out the fact that A it is also about a job loss and apart from other demands that they are putting out in the current set of strikes which includes pay rise and addressing inflation but it's also about the fact that the railways is increasingly being turned into a more like a luxury product at the behest of private railway companies by the conservative government rather than as a public utility that is necessary for most people to continue and for use as a public mode transport right can you tell us more about the demands of the RMT and you know how is the government trying to justify this and how is it trying to you know what kind of response has they have they given to the RMT's demands well at the moment right now what we are seeing is a very you know loop on like loop on is not just a very mild way to put it pretty much a complete negligence on the part of the government to address workers demands at this moment but and the and this is something that not just rail workers have brought up this is something that everybody has brought up the fact that UK has gone through some of the worst outcomes of the COVID-19 pandemic in the developed world and and it is only it is one of the few places in the western world that actually face a double digit inflation like at this point since 2021 wages have pretty much real wages have completely declined across sectors and and it's not just the railways but especially for public service workers and you have seen price hikes going by up to 12 to 13 percent under current estimates in the last two years and that is primarily because of the outcomes of the COVID-19 the level of mismanagement of the economy aside that is pretty much the charge that has been put up against the both the Boris Johnson government but also under Rishi Sunak was also the one who had led the counterpandemic program under the Johnson government in both cases this this is just one part of the issue like but also significantly important for the railway workers at this current point of track so addressing like the current set of proposals that the rail companies have given is pretty much just going to have a very small meager change in wages we're looking at something like 12 percent or 13 percent price at the minimum which is not enough considering that as I pointed out like price hike has happened over the last two years has been about 13 percent pretty much we are looking at real decline in wages and that is not going to address that this is going to keep wages stagnant in most ways it is also going to not address any of the issues that is that comes along with the cost of living crisis that is still spiraling in the UK unlike most places in the world it is still a big massive problem over there and brain workers obviously are one of the worst aspects because they were also the ones who were on the front lines of you know managing the economy at the time and there has been no wage hikes in the past four years for them and this and this is pretty much a situation where like and we are also looking obviously at the time when public transport has been generally affected and the government is trying to use that as an excuse rather than to modernize the system with greater investment they're going to come down and they're going to try to push it into you know leisure travelers targeting them rather than you know you know doubling down the public utility factor of the railway system in itself so that is pretty much what the RMT has also pointed out the fact that the government is pretty much just doubling down on its stand of cutting down of austerity at a time when workers are suffering so heavily. Right thanks Anish and we'll be back to you again shortly. In South Korea the Defense Minister has said it is planning on relocating statues of five Korean independent fighters this includes Hong Wom Do an important leader who was also associated with the Soviet Communist Party. This announcement has sparked debates and controversy critics have denounced this move as an attempt to wipe out the legacy of the preceding liberal administration of Moon Jae-in. We are joined again by Anish for more details. So Anish can you start by telling us about you know who these independence fighters are and why is the government planning to you know relocate their statues what is behind this move? Yeah so let's begin with the fact that these bus that were placed at the military academy were placed in 2018 as part of expanding the memorials for freedom fighters under the Moon Jae-in government the previous government and pretty much it commemorated heroes that were otherwise well while they were widely recognized as heroes they were still not taken into consideration in official commemorations because of their associations with the communist movement and obviously the Soviet army and the Chinese military who were also part of the resistance against the Japanese imperialism and so these four figures especially Hong Wom Do was pretty much at the forefront of such resistance a very partisan resistance obviously supported by the Soviet Union and the and the communist in China and in many ways this collaboration of like an internationalist collaboration of communists were at the heart of like of the liberation of Korea altogether it was not just the defeat of Japanese by Americans but also the fact that average Koreans took to a popular struggle against the Japanese imperialists who pretty much wreck havoc in their country not just during the war but before as well the decades leading to the war as well so Hong Wom Do was one of them he was somebody who was well known to have fought like guerrilla fashion had taken you know lessons from the Chinese communists had worked and even stayed in the Soviet Union where he died eventually but he is still considered one of the greatest heroes of the Korean independence and definitely the commemoration was something that many conservatives did not really take lightly or you know did not take very kindly to and that is pretty much at the heart of this relocation move their whole argument is that because the Korean or the South Korean constitution which causes the Republic of Korea being you know establishing a state of liberal and free market state is not in line with the ideological and they're very clearly saying that this is pretty much because of ideological differences with these historical figures that they want to relocate them away from the military academy but they were military strategists and freedom fighters who led who were part of the Korean independence army and so the this argument does not really matter when you consider the fact that army is supposed to be ideally non-ideological so this ideological question is pretty much at the heart of the problem here right now and can you also comment on this rising trend of anti-communism under the current South Korean dispensation yeah so there has always been this tendency at least under conservative governments to undermine the communist history in the Korean peninsula primarily because it is pretty much something that was carried over from the World War era history when South Korea was also under a dictatorship a pro-us dictatorship much less and which also witnessed several multiple anti-communist massacres in its time many of which still remain under reported or not taken into consideration and are still being litigated in the courts that aside the the conservatives and the hardcore conservatives that you and you also feel the current president is part of has never taken tightly to that history they have been vehemently anti-communist very clearly in the public lives and their past as well and so for them to actually take this most not really surprising and we have also seen that like how that actually affects a lot of Korean national interest because obviously they have treaded into a point where they are undermining nationalist history because of ideological differences and that is something that has struck a chord across Korean public and also let's remember this is coming at a time when the Korean government the South Korean government has bent over backwards to accommodate Japanese considerations especially in the release of Fukushima waters and that has also not gone down well with the public so this is pretty much another hot topic issue that they have brought themselves into and this is going to really backfire at this point in time right thanks Anish for joining us and this is all we have in this episode of the daily debrief for more details on these stories and for other such stories visit our website peoplesdispatch.org and our social media pages on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for more video updates visit our YouTube page thank you for watching