alt Hacker NewsEspecially because it sounds like the Philippines is pushing for a 4 day workweek, but the rest of SEA is asking people to work from home, use less AC, take the stairs…
Especially because it sounds like the Philippines is pushing for a 4 day workweek, but the rest of SEA is asking people to work from home, use less AC, take the stairs…
It's also Vietnam, Thailand, and unofficially Pakistan.
The reality is the bigger Asian nations like China, India, SK, and Japan that worked on building resilient alternatives after the 2022-23 ONG shock due to the Russian Invasion of Ukraine aren't as dramatically impacted. The others didn't or were hit by other crises at the same time.
For example, in Pakistan's case, their government raised fuel taxes by around 33% because they didn't meet their IMF loan terms [0] but somehow found $11M to buy a private jet [1] for the CM of Punjab who is also the niece of the PM and the daughter of the former PM and Pakistan is in the middle of a war with Afghanistan [2].
Edit: can't reply
> gas cylinder booking...
The gas cylinder/LPG issue is due to consumer habits - induction and electric stovetops have been available in India for decades, but there has been a cultural aversion to adopting electric.
Even Indian Americans in the US prefer using Gas Stovetops over Electric for cultural reasons (eg. I've had my parents say the "taste" of food is worse on electric instead of gas stovetops despite living here since Clinton was president).
And dhabas and restaurants used to use coal briquettes or kerosene until those were banned in the 2000s-2010s for pollution reasons (much help that did /s) and to promote LNG and CNG, and will most likely revert back to those.
Additionally, India has shifted from Qatari to Omani LNG [3], which was what India was already using before the India-Qatar FTA led to a diplomatic thaw between the two.
It's the same situation in Vietnam as well.
> freight is pretty much fucked
Indian diesel prices are being subsidized and kept constant [4]. That said, this is a good forcing function to begin India's shift to electric trucks.
And freight and passenger rail is already around 98-99% electrified in India [5] which reduces the need for diesel.
[0] - https://www.dawn.com/news/1979709
[1] - https://www.arabnews.com/node/26978/pakistan
[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Afghanistan%E2%80%93Pakis...
[3] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/india-gail-buys-oman...
[4] - https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/petrol-diesel-prices-to-rema...
[5] - https://infra.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/railways/ind...