The Know Daily - Wednesday 28 June 2023

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News to get you fired up: two baby Komodo dragons have been born at Chester Zoo. The new additions are not only surprisingly cute, but conservationists also hope that they will help ensure the long-term survival of the endangered species, which is under threat as a result of habitat loss and climate change.

🎂 Another year younger

All South Koreans have instantly become a year or two younger, as the country scraps its traditional age-counting methods in favour of the international standard.

How was age previously calculated?
“Under the previous system, the country’s citizens are deemed to be a year old when they are born, and a year is added every 1 January,” explained The Guardian. “The unusual custom meant that a baby born on New Year’s Eve would become two years old as soon as the clock strikes midnight.”

Why has the switch been made?
President Yoon Suk Yeol pushed for the change when he ran for office last year, saying that traditional age-counting methods created “unnecessary social and economic costs”. According to the BBC, these have included disputes over insurance pay-outs and eligibility for government assistance programmes.

How will it work in practice?
In a government survey carried out last year, 86% of South Koreans said they would adopt the international system in their everyday lives.

But the new law won’t change the year in which people enter compulsory education, become eligible for national service or gain the right to legally buy alcohol and cigarettes. “A third system that governs those areas of life - in which a person’s age is calculated from zero at birth and a year is added on New Year’s Day - will remain in place for the time being,” reported The Guardian.

Is there anything else I should know?
South Korea’s government recently announced new measures to tackle the country’s falling birth rate, after it hit record lows last year. Perhaps the most eye-catching detail is a plan to make the country’s university entrance exam less difficult, so that parents no longer feel obliged to send their children to expensive private cram schools.

There has also been a push-back against the country’s “remarkably popular” no-kid zones - defined by CNN as “disturbance-free environments for the grown-ups” - in an effort to make South Korea more child-friendly.