Country diary: This is how bad the heatwave has got for us arable farmers – I’m going on holiday | Colin Chappell

South Korean farmers are suffering in record heat, as Hong Kong reports its highest ever temperature and Japan swelters through newly designated ‘cruelly hot’ days In a potato field in Yanggu county, 80 miles (130km) north-east of Seoul, Lee Sang-hyuk dug into the soil and found nothing worth saving. A week earlier the crop, located in Gangwon province, had looked fine. Now the potatoes came up soft and collapsing, “like boiled potatoes”, spoiled by heat that had turned the ground into something closer to an oven...

RCN calls for more air conditioners as Burnham faces pressure to recognise urgency of adaptation to climate crisis Nurses are collapsing during shifts amid “inhumane and impossible” conditions caused by extreme heat, their union has warned, as Andy Burnham promised to grapple with “the bigger questions” of climate adaptation. Amid growing pressure from Labour backbenches to fully acknowledge the urgency of adaptation measures as the climate crisis bites, Burnham said he was for now focusing on the immediate crises caused by an ongoing summer of extreme heat...

Oman’s Environment Authority said Wednesday that oil leaking from a tanker grounded off the country’s coast had reached mainland beaches. The spill threatened marine habitats and a nearby protected area as strong winds and monsoon currents spread the oil, raising fears it could reach other islands.