 Community health workers in South Asia have put forward a series of demands for better work conditions. What are these crucial workers seeking? Japan has set to release 1 million metric tons of treated radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant, a move which is controversial domestically and among its neighbors. What are the responses? And UPS workers have voted by a huge margin to approve a contract finalized in July. What does this mean for their protest? This is the Daily Debrief, these are our stories for today and before you go any further if you are watching this on YouTube, don't forget to hit that subscribe button. In many countries in South Asia, community health workers play a vital role in last mile health services. In countries with great population density, they are often the professionals who are the face of healthcare for many people. However, they often are not recognized for their work and do not get the necessary benefits. In some cases, they are not even acknowledged as full-time workers. Community health workers from South Asian countries have come together to issue a charter urging the governments and international agencies to respect, protect and promote their rights as workers. The demands have been backed by major international unions and labour rights bodies. We have with us Jyotsna, who is at their conference. So Jyotsna, before we talk about the charter, can you tell us about the work done by these community health workers and why are they so essential to healthcare? Yeah, thanks for inviting Suryangya. So firstly, who are community health workers? Community health workers in South Asia are the only women workforce. They are all women. It is not most of them are women. All of them are women. These are the jobs that the governments expect women to do. And they are the frontline health and healthcare workers. And so in India, they are called Ashas or Anganwadi's that in Pakistan, for example, they are female community health volunteers in Nepal. They have a different name. So there are different names, but essentially the work they do, which is a lot of work. I mean, the list is very long. I can only give a few examples. For example, taking care of the entire maternal and child health at a very basic level. So they are the ones on whom the responsibility falls to identify who all are with who are the women who are pregnant in their constituency in that particular area. And once they identify that and it actually involves asking very difficult questions at times. It's like keeping a track of periods of women so that if they miss, then you tell them that they have to take the pregnancy test. And if that comes positive, then everything that begins after that. So antenatal care and postnatal care, ensuring that they go for ultrasounds if required. They are connected to the doctors if required, taking care of the vaccination once the child is born and ensuring that the vaccination happens. Identifying cases of TB, finding actively if there are cases of TB, identifying diabetes, counselling families about family planning and childhood. And basically apart from all of this, and then you also have these special weeks and days that the government does, which are campaigns for, say, nutrition or for vaccination. So they are the ones who go door to door talking about it or asking people to come to a primary health care centres and do it. And we have been attending this community health workers conference in Kathmandu, in Nepal. And I can just tell you a couple of stories which you hear and you are like, wow, how can one person do this? So most of them have to cover up to 10 to 20 houses every day. So they leave in the morning from their house. They walk to these, at least those many houses, but at times it is 60 houses. Then there are weeks, special weeks, when they cover up to 250 households in one week, that is in six days. And all of this is done by walking. They do not get any support in terms of how to travel or any, you know, vehicle. So they have to arrange on their own. So they do all this kind of work. And in short, who they are, they are the women, people who families first give a call to whenever they have a health problem. So they call them and then they have to figure out what to do about it, which actually means getting calls late at night. So it is a literally 24 hours job that these women do. So it is very important. So when the countries talk about better maternal and child health care that have happened across the world, they have played a very important role in reducing maternal mortality and reducing infant mortality. So they are the ones who have done those things. Yeah, exactly. And can you quickly tell us about the challenges that they are facing in this work and the demands that they have put forward in their charter? Right. So just to tell you about the demands first, maybe, and then where it comes from. What they're asking is there are separate categories. If you look at the charter of demands and it is called the charter of demands of community health workers in South Asia, they are asking for better wages because though the wages differ, they are something like at times twenty five hundred rupees or in some states of India, say, nine thousand rupees, they are paid really badly. And they are not considered one of the major demands is and that is the slogan is community health work is work. They are not considered as workers. They are considered as volunteers. So you as if you're volunteering for all of this work. So you get remuneration or just you are given basic minimum allowance in Nepal. The allowance is the only allowance they get is travel allowance, which is paid against some bills and those adherence allowance. There is no wage. There is no minimum wage that is so they are asking to be considered as government employees and at least the minimum wage to be paid to them. But preferably as much as government employees get paid and therefore the scale will come and they will their wage will raise after every years. They will get promotions and all of that. Nothing of that sort happens. Once you join as an Asha worker, you retire as an Asha worker. Talking about retirement, there are no benefits after retirement they get. So one of these women, they actually they were telling us that I mean, she will retire after a couple of years. And she's very tense because her friends who retired a few years ago, some of them are actually begging on the road after doing so much of work for the society and for the government for 30 years, 35 years, they actually end up begging because they don't get any benefits or work as domestic help in others houses. So pension and social security is another demand. Basic health care is another demand. And and the wages, as I said, and being recognized as proper workers. These are fighting against stigma. There are a lot of cases of sexual harassment that they face because they're just entering into others houses and that is the part of the job. So there has to be redressal. These are some of the demands that they have and it comes from very I mean, experiences that they have. OK. And just lastly, infrastructure, because when they are actually in the community, they have no access to toilets. They are not provided water. There are no rooms where they can sit, so they do not know where to eat food. And these some of them don't end up eating. A lot of them actually face UTI urinary tract infection because they don't drink water because they do not have toilets to go to. And this is like very normal. And again, you hear them saying that we talk to people about health, but our health, we cannot take care of and which creates a lot of stress to them because they know what it can do. So so, yeah, so having toilets, room to sit, water to be provided on a daily basis. These are against some of the very basic demands that they're asking for. Yeah. Right. Thank you, Jyotsana, for talking to us about this very important story. Japan has announced that it will start releasing wastewater from the defunct Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant on Thursday, August 24th, despite stiff opposition both within and outside the country. The announcement was made by Prime Minister Pomeo Kishida earlier this week. Even though Japan's discharge plants have been green-lighted by the International Atomic Energy Agency, calls for boycott of seafood and aquatic products from Japan have persisted. In a region already tense with recent geopolitical developments, what impact will the release of the wastewater have? We have with us Anish. So, Anish, can you start off by giving us a bit of context? What is this wastewater that is being discharged? You know, what is the science behind it? Yes. So, I mean, we obviously all know about the the devastating earthquake and tsunami in 2011 that actually caused a failure in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant. And pretty much this wastewater that we're talking about is basically the water that was used to cool down the reactor while it was functioning. And so during the time when it was had to be, you know, it has not been decommissioned yet, but when the plant went defunct, these waters had to be stored. And it's been more than a decade now. And as per the government's statement and its side of argument, if they have to decommission the plant completely, which is what their plan is, they have to start discharging this wastewater. The argument that the government is giving, the Japanese government is giving, is that the water has been treated very well and has been diluted. So the only radioactive material that is found in the water wastewater right now is helium. And now the thing with helium is that it cannot be decided like we do not have the technology to scientifically remove it from any water body at the moment. So the thing is that we have to dilute it. That's the only other solution if your plan is to dump it into, you know, dump it into the ocean, essentially speaking. And that has to happen. It has to be treated to a level that is far below the current IAEA levels of wastewater discharges. And this has been done like we have to also talk about the fact that this has been already being done in Europe and other parts of the world where nuclear waste waters are discharged into the ocean. But the problem here is not so much about the science of the matter because the IAEA report, which green lighted the plan by Japan, actually did only very specifically and narrowly spoke about the safety of weather in the plan. If the plan of discharging water in the ocean is safe in the if it endangers local communities, the marine population and also, you know, other countries in the neighborhood. And obviously that came out good for them. But when you look at it very narrowly in that respect, you do not really see other plans that are possible that could have been done by the Japanese government. And obviously the larger political issue of not consulting with anybody who is affected, including your neighborhood. And that is pretty much at the heart of the issue here. It is more about the lack of transfer. It's like we need to also talk about how this entire thing, like the announcement, it was a 48 hour announcement that we are going to start discharging the water into the ocean without like obviously people knew that they would start doing it by this month. But nobody knew the date or the time or even the amount now. But the 48 hour notice kind of thing is something that obviously struck a lot of people and we are already seeing protests not just in the neighborhood, say China and South Korea, but also in Japan. And that really shows how little the government has done to actually reach out to the people. So Anish, can you expand a little more on these concerns that are being raised, you know, both internally and externally regarding the discharge of this nuclear waste water? Yeah, so like we live in with obviously what's happening within Japan. You have the fishing community, not just traditional ones. Also, like there is an entire community of fishing folks on the east coast of Japan who fear and very rightly so that their livelihoods will be affected. And like there is obviously some level of alarmism regarding the waste water per se, but it's not necessarily just the waste water. The fact that your, you know, your supply chains will be affected. There will be no demand for your products once the waste water starts reaching your ship. And this is something that is going to affect livelihoods of hundreds of families across the east coast. And these were the people who were protests in Tokyo earlier today. And this clearly shows that the government, even though it gave a statement that it actually, you know, engaged with people from the fishing industry. It was pretty much just talking about corporations in the fishing industry and not necessarily communities and people who have been traditionally part of the fishing community and the industry as well. And who also supply a good amount of, you know, aquatic products, not just primarily for the Japanese, but also for others as well. So, A, you have not consulted them. And this is similar to the concerns that have been raised by countries like China countries like South Korea, like obviously the South Korean government has bent over backwards in downplaying the concerns of its people. But, you know, the kind of protest that we're looking at in Seoul right now and the amount of opposition in the country clearly shows there is a complete disconnect between the government and the people there. Despite the outreach by the government, talking about how safe it is or whatever the plan is, the primary concerns of the fact that their concerns were never addressed. South Koreans were really not consulted. They were allowed to investigate and inspect the plan separately, but they were not really consulted on the matter. And this is something that China and China was completely left out. Hong Kong was completely left out. And so were Pacific Island nations in the Southern Pacific region, the Australasian region. And that clearly also shows that there is this sort of disconnect between what has been planned and the fact that the government really is not transparent with this plan right now. What we know is the first phase of the plan. We do not know what will be happening for the next several years. There are media reports saying that the discharges can go on for up to three decades even if the amount of water being released is that small. So that clearly also shows that this sort of long term plan is something that has been taken quite unilaterally by the Japanese government, by the Kishida government. And even its own people were not consulted at this point in time. And we're also going to see that effect because we are also looking at import bans from China, from Hong Kong, which pretty much together combine, you know, attracts about 40 percent of all Japanese aquatic exports. And that is going to hit their industries far worse than anybody else. And so this is something that the Japanese government had to have, you know, taken far more seriously. And it is not necessarily just the science that we're talking about. Obviously, the science of discharging might be safe. But there are also other concerns and issues that were never addressed in throughout the entire process. And that is primarily the reason why we are seeing such reaction to this announcement as well. Great. Thank you, Anish, for talking to us. And we'll be back to you in just a moment to discuss another story. A big step forward for UPS workers in the United States as union members ratify historic agreement on August 22nd. UPS workers organized by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters voted by an overwhelming majority of 86.3 percent to ratify a contract negotiated in July. This is the highest vote for a contract in the history of the union at UPS. The contract is the largest single employer contract in the country with UPS teamsters representing 340,000 workers. The new contract enshrines several key victories achieved by the workers, avoiding a looming strike. We now speak to Anish on the deal and the implications. So, Anish, this victory by the UPS workers is the culmination of a long strike of months of organizing. Can you tell us what is in the new contract and how is it different from the previous contracts? Well, a big part of the contract is how a fair deal it is to present for UPS workers compared to the 2018 agreement, which was quite controversial, even when it was passed by a small majority, but still at the time the leadership of teamsters was widely criticized, including by its rank and file members, for allowing for such a deal that could actually put workers behind in terms of real wages over the next several years. And obviously, they felt that cut very instantaneously. In a couple of years, we saw the pandemic and delivery workers were the first to be impacted throughout this entire crisis, the global crisis that we saw at the time. And UPS workers were no different, obviously. And we saw real wages being cut eventually because of the economic outcomes of the pandemic. And we saw in several cases about real wages being going down by at least 10% in certain instances. So that clearly shows how behind workers were at the time when they actually passed the overwhelming lay past the strike vote earlier this year. And obviously that threatened the entire industry as well. And so the current deal pretty much offers a massive increase from about $16 per hour on an average. Workers can expect now about $21 per hour. And this is also going to show and other sort of benefits we're looking at includes about $2.75 per hour of a blank wage hike for everybody at the moment that can actually give them some of stolen wages during the pandemic era. So this is a massive improvement. And if you look at several other specifics of the agreement, we're looking at something like 70% wage hike over the next couple of years for these workers, which is way overdue considering the cost of living crisis that has impacted not just the US, but obviously everybody around the world, but specifically the US during the pandemic and the rising prices, the inflation rates have not really gone down to the extent that it should be. And that has obviously impacted just for especially for those who are making about close to around minimum wages in the United States at the moment. And this includes obviously the UPS workers. Of course, the UPS mobilization is just one example. There have been many strikes by workers in different sectors in the United States in recent times, even as we speak, workers in Hollywood are on strike. So what lessons can be drawn from the mobilization by the UPS workers? Well, one of the things that is the highlight of the current victory is the fact that the new leadership, which obviously began because, you know, came out of the discontent, meant among the teams to this union after the 2018 fiasco, really created a leadership that was willing to fight. And not just like come to a settlement at the first problem. And that just is the difference here. We are looking at union leaderships now who are more willing to fight till the end and to see through the struggle and to make sure that their demands are met and rather than compromise with the employers. And that is something that we saw, that is something that is quite clear. Like the fact that the teamsters union and obviously UPS workers did not have to go through the strike to make, to have the demands met, clearly shows that the willingness to struggle made a big impact at the moment. And that is something that obviously, you're seeing obviously with Hollywood workers, writers and actors alike, both of them on an extended indefinite strike at the moment, which is quite historic and hasn't happened for more than half a century now. It's something that is also seen that you're seeing with, you know, wider labor militancy across the United States. And this militancy obviously is a product of the crisis that has been impacted, that has impacted workers across sectors. And this is not just Hollywood or the delivery workers. We are seeing that the fast food chains, we're seeing that with, you know, retail workers and so on. And across the board, you're seeing either unionizing crisis being, you know, quite going on a massive speed, obviously teamsters is one of them. When you look at, say, Amazon workers unionizing or Starbucks workers unionizing, they're still part of that, you know, significant process. But then there are also traditional trade unions who are, you know, upping the ante when it comes to, you know, fighting for fair contracts for their, for their members. And this is a very good time for labor movements at the point. And this victory obviously will obviously boost and hopefully boost morale and, you know, boost the movement itself across sectors and across trade unions. Right. Thank you, Anish, for talking to us. And that's all for today. Thanks very much for watching Daily Debrief. Our website, peoplesispass.org and our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts have more of our stories. Our YouTube channel has more updates and this show. Remember to subscribe. Thanks again for watching.