A day in the life of Asia’s fuel crisis

## Summary
Photograph: Anadolu/Getty View image in fullscreen People queue to refill their empty gas cylinders in Noida, on the outskirts of New Delhi, India. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty A day in the life of Asia’s fuel crisis From farms in New Zealand to factories in Delhi, the effects of the oil crisis triggered by the Iran war are rippling across Asia 4.30am Kaipara, New Zealand James Brady, farmer We’ve got a small dairy farm, north of Auckland. It’s all essential activity.” View image in fullscreen James Brady prepares the cows for milking on his 150-hectare dairy farm where he and his wife, Nicola, milk 200 cows, while feeling the impact of rising fuel costs. View image in fullscreen Kim Hooin commutes by bus in Sejong, South Korea. 12pm Surin province, Thailand Teerayut Ruenrerng, owner of a mobile grocery truck At about midday, I return home from my morning selling session.

## Article Content
People queue to refill their empty gas cylinders in Noida, on the outskirts of New Delhi, India.
Photograph: Anadolu/Getty
View image in fullscreen
People queue to refill their empty gas cylinders in Noida, on the outskirts of New Delhi, India.
Photograph: Anadolu/Getty
A day in the life of Asia’s fuel crisis
From farms in New Zealand to factories in Delhi, the effects of the oil crisis triggered by the Iran war are rippling across Asia
4.30am
Kaipara, New Zealand
James Brady, farmer
We’ve got a small dairy farm, north of Auckland. We milk 200 cows and have a small amount of beef cattle and young stock.
We start about 4.30am in the morning – checking cows, feeding, milking and then we do it again in the afternoon. Most of the day is spent tending to stock, moving animals, and we’re busy renewing pastures at the moment.
Diesel is our main fuel – we run two tractors and machinery. We have quad bikes that run on petrol. Each month we use 900 litres of diesel and 200–300 litres of petrol. We’ve just used up last month’s diesel and we’ve been paying about NZ$1.85 a litre ($1; £0.80). Diesel is up $1.03 per litre and petrol up 33c per litre. That means an increase of $1,252 a month, or $15,024 a year.
It’s not just our own fuel supply – it’s the contractors that come into do work, and fertiliser has gone up 40%. It all has huge flow-on effects to our costs.
As a farmer, you have nobody to pass that cost on to. That might mean we’re not investing in the farm, or we have to put off, or delay, maintenance costs. We’re trying to run as efficiently as we can – we’re not just using equipment and burning fuel for the sake of it. But we’re a bit stuck – the cows still need to be fed, we still need to harvest the feed. It’s all essential activity.”
View image in fullscreen
James Brady prepares the cows for milking on his 150-hectare dairy farm where he and his wife, Nicola, milk 200 cows, while feeling the impact of rising fuel costs.
Photograph: Fiona Goodall/The Guardian
10:00am
Port Vila, Vanuatu
Daniel Thomas, 47, bus driver
The threat of higher fuel prices is making people in Port Vila nervous. The government says fuel prices will increase soon and like many people here, I’m worried I won’t make enough to cover all my expenses.
I drive my bus from 6am to 9pm through the streets of Port Vila. I make about A$120 a day ($82; £62) and I’m buying fuel every few days. When prices increase, I could be taking home as little as A$70 a day, and that might not be enough to cover loan repayments and other expenses. With temperatures up around 30C in Port Vila, our buses must run with air-conditioning, chewing up even more fuel.
In Vanuatu, lots of drivers have loans on their vehicles and they don’t know how they will pay the bank every month once fuel gets more expensive. The only option will be to hike fares, and that won’t go down well with passengers in Port Vila. It’s putting drivers in a tough position but without raising fares we won’t be able to survive.
View image in fullscreen
Daniel Thomas, a bus driver in Port Vila, Vanuatu, says drivers might have to raise fares.
Photograph: Antoine Malsungai
10.30am
Sejong, South Korea
Kim Hooin, 55, public service worker
My morning starts the same way it always has: alarm at 6:20am in my apartment in Cheongju. But the journey to work has changed. Since 25 March, when the government imposed
mandatory vehicle restrictions
on public sector workers, I’ve been taking the bus every day. The vehicle five-day system means I can’t drive one day a week based on my licence plate number. Even on days I could drive, I choose not to. Fuel prices have risen so much. I leave home 15 minutes earlier to catch the 7:10am bus to Sejong, the administrative capital 130km south of Seoul.
I listen to music or watch YouTube during the 40-minute commute. Before the restrictions, I drove my own car in 25 minutes. It takes longer now, but I arrive early for work anyway, so there’s no real inconvenience.
I work at a government agency and my job involves managing and driving three vehicles and planning daily transport for officials. We follow the five-day rules strictly and only use vehicles when absolutely necessary, prioritising electric cars. When I arrive at the office at 7:50am, I plug in the government EVs, inspect everything’s OK, and prepare the driving schedule.
The government’s 12-point
energy-saving campaign
also calls for shorter showers, charging phones during the day, and doing laundry on weekends. At home, I no longer fill the bathtub. It’s not just about showers, it means saving water, so I take light showers instead. I do my washing on weekends anyway. For phone charging, I try to do it during the day, but because of work I need to charge it anytime, day or night.
I think this energy campaign isn’t just about those specific actions. It’s the message of overcoming difficulties together. The measures feel manageable, and Korean people have always had a strong spirit of frugality. We’ve overcome c

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## Expert Analysis

### Merits
- The measures feel manageable, and Korean people have always had a strong spirit of frugality.

### Areas for Consideration
- Photograph: Fiona Goodall/The Guardian 10:00am Port Vila, Vanuatu Daniel Thomas, 47, bus driver The threat of higher fuel prices is making people in Port Vila nervous.
- We are not only facing the impact of the Iran war, but things have been more difficult ever since the conflict between Cambodia and Thailand.

### Implications
- That might mean we’re not investing in the farm, or we have to put off, or delay, maintenance costs.
- It’s all essential activity.” View image in fullscreen James Brady prepares the cows for milking on his 150-hectare dairy farm where he and his wife, Nicola, milk 200 cows, while feeling the impact of rising fuel costs.
- The government says fuel prices will increase soon and like many people here, I’m worried I won’t make enough to cover all my expenses.
- When prices increase, I could be taking home as little as A$70 a day, and that might not be enough to cover loan repayments and other expenses.

### Expert Commentary
This article covers fuel, gas, prices topics. Notable strengths include discussion of fuel. Areas of concern are also raised. Readability: Flesch-Kincaid grade 0.0. Word count: 2556.