2009年1月31日 星期六

血型書ㄆ暢銷

據日本最大出版集團東販公司統計,日本去年最暢銷的十本書中,有四本是以血型如何決定個性為主題。

2009年1月30日 星期五

日本生產下降情況“非常嚴重”

日本生產下降情況“非常嚴重”
日本汽車廠
日本生產率下降情況"非常嚴重"

日本經濟財政大臣與謝野馨說,日本生產下降情況"非常嚴重"。

與上一月相比,日本工業產出在去年12月下降了幾乎10%。

與謝野馨說,這種情況的出現史無前例,下跌還將持續下去。

日本政府還說,去年12月日本的失業率升至4.4%,比前一個月上升了半個百分點。

日本官方數字顯示,日本失業人數現有270萬人,比上一年增加40萬人。

與謝野馨在新聞發佈會上表示,日本從未經歷生產下降如此劇烈的情況。

他指出,"這個問題非常嚴重"。

日本經濟在去年第三季度出現下滑,經濟在7年裡首次進入衰退。

由於外國對諸如日本汽車等產品的需求急劇下降,日本的出口劇減。

日本首相麻生太郎在議會表示,他將採取措施,使日本成為首個從全球金融危機中走出來的國家。

日本共同社引述日本厚生勞動省的最新數字說,以製造業為中心的裁員潮使得去年10月到今年3月期間已失業或即將失業的日本非正式員工達到124,802人。

這個數據比去年12月的調查增加了約五成,表明因經濟危機加劇已導致就業形勢急劇惡化。

2009年1月29日 星期四

The Fat Lady is about to join in (Japan's politics)

(

The Fat Lady

The portrait of the Fat Lady is the door to Gryffindor Tower, which is hidden behind her painting. She will open it (sometimes grudgingly) when the correct password is uttered. She is often upset after being awakened, and is often seen drunk with her best friend, Violet. The Fat Lady has no other known name, and it is unknown whether she is supposed to represent a real person. In Philosopher's Stone, she leaves her portrait in the middle of the night, locking Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville out of Gryffindor Tower. In Prisoner of Azkaban, Sirius slashes the Fat Lady’s portrait and it is some time before she dares to guard Gryffindor Tower again. After her portrait was restored, she requested protection next time someone tries to attack her portrait. Thus, two security trolls were hired.

In the first film the Fat Lady is played by the late Elizabeth Spriggs. She does not appear in the second film. In the third film she is played by Dawn French. She does not appear in the fourth or fifth films.)

Japan's politics

The Fat Lady is about to join in

Jan 29th 2009 | TOKYO
From The Economist print edition

Even its own members reckon Japan’s ruling LDP faces annihilation


AFP

THE wave which first broke in earnest over Japan’s economy towards the end of last year now looks set to sweep away a political system dominated for half a century of almost unbroken power by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). That, at least, is now the view of parliamentarians of all stripes. This week, a poll by the Nikkei newspaper saw the government’s approval rating fall to 19%, abjectly low. Morbid LDP members admit that a party that has seen four prime ministers in as many years is not just bereft of ideas but has lost the stomach for a fight. The government, they say, will plop into the lap of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in an election that the prime minister, Taro Aso (pictured above), has to call by September.

Mr Aso deserves a scintilla of credit for trying. Though he assembled a cabinet of exceptional mediocrity last September, he expected to call a snap election while his approval ratings were still fairly high. Mr Aso was then faster than most to grasp the severity of the global slowdown, and that Japan, its economy driven by exports, would be disproportionately hit. More than once he has put off calling an election in order to confront the slowdown. He saw through stimulus measures and loan guarantees inherited from his predecessor. He announced a second stimulus, including a ¥2 trillion ($22 billion) cash handout to households. And he declared that nothing so frivolous as an election would disrupt preparations for the full budget for the fiscal year that begins in April, in which the economy would get another boost. This was to be Mr Aso’s three-stage rocket.


It has turned out to be a damp squib. The new spending is not large, yet promoting the proposals has consumed his political capital. For a start, instead of pushing the second stimulus through the Diet (parliament) at once, Mr Aso put it off until the session that began in January, so as not to divert energies from the annual budgeting ritual. Yet that has given more time for the public to turn against the handout as a gimmick, and for the opposition to make hay. Citing the handout, one prominent LDP member, Yoshimi Watanabe, a former financial-services minister who has long been unhappy about the lack of administrative and supply-side reforms, stomped out of the party on January 13th.

Mr Watanabe’s departure set off speculation about whether civil war within the LDP was about to break out into the open, with defections to a new political force. If only in this respect, the scale of Japan’s slump benefits Mr Aso for now, since it has stilled such a rebellion. The most powerful critic of the LDP’s lack of reform zeal, Hidenao Nakagawa, a former party secretary-general, now says that political realignment must happen only when voters demand a clearer direction. He will not, he says, be the one to fire the assassin’s shot at Sarajevo. And Yasuhisa Shiozaki, a former chief cabinet secretary, has not accepted Mr Watanabe’s entreaties to join him. Rather, Mr Shiozaki says, he and a few colleagues will push for a new stimulus package worth ¥10 trillion—this time tied to changes in highly regulated areas such as health care, education and agriculture.

Potential rebels share two other calculations. Mr Aso might yet bow out, allowing one more boundlessly self-regarding buggins to contest the next election for the LDP. The second is that as the chances rise of an outright victory by the DPJ in the next election, so the leverage of any third political force diminishes. A wholesale political realignment in Japan may have to wait until the DPJ attains office and stumbles.

In the meantime, says Tadamori Oshima, the LDP’s Diet-affairs chief in the lower house, the odds of Mr Aso’s passing his various packages have shortened. On January 27th the second stimulus package was bulldozed through. Until recently, a move led by Mr Nakagawa and Mr Shiozaki looked as if it might derail passage of the next fiscal year’s budget. To pass enabling legislation, the ruling coalition must use its “supermajority” in the lower house to override the opposition-controlled upper house. But the rebels had objected to language about the need to raise the consumption (sales) tax in 2011 in order to finance social welfare. The rebels backed down after it was made more explicit that the rise hinged not just on economic recovery, but on reducing the power of the bureaucracy. Mr Oshima now says he is certain that the supermajority, without which Mr Aso would have to resign, will hold.

This brings only a brief respite for the prime minister. The economy is worsening fast: in December year-on-year exports fell by 35%; surveys of consumer confidence are at all-time lows; while the central bank talks of an economic “emergency”. This week, the government announced convoluted plans for public funds to be used to buy shares in cash-strapped smaller companies. Though it has not been announced, it also wants to force big city banks to take public-capital injections, with no strings attached, rather than risk sending the stockmarket down further by issuing fresh shares. If Mr Aso plans further stimulus packages, publicising them now might only heighten the tooth-pulling pain of passing the current measures.

In his policy speech to the Diet on January 28th, the prime minister promised to bring Japan out of recession before the rest of the world, yet he gave few clues as to how. Admittedly, he expounded on the need for sweeping changes to the tax system, including raising the consumption tax. By mentioning the tax, Mr Aso meant to signal his commitment to responsible politics. Yet nothing he said hinted at tough structural changes to promote growth. Drained of influence and written off by his own party, a single weapon remains with Mr Aso: when to dissolve the Diet and call the election. As to when he will do that, says Mr Oshima, probably the prime minister’s closest and most important ally, only Mr Aso and God know.


日本便利商店逆勢賺「軟實力」?

日本便利商店 逆勢賺翻

【經濟日報/編譯莊雅婷/綜合橫濱九日電】

金融海嘯席捲日本,包括Sony與豐田等業界龍頭均無一倖免,唯獨便利商店絲毫不受經濟不景氣影響,靠著五花八門的便民服務,業績蒸蒸日上。

類似7-Eleven的便利商店,目前在日本約有4.17萬家,且數量持續增加,服務便利性號稱是全球首屈一指。

例如,消費者在Happy Lawson育兒便利商店除了能購買新鮮的壽司、喝飲料,還可以繳稅、替寶寶換尿片、訂機票與音樂會門票,甚至訂購家電產品

全家便利商店可以幫客戶預約居家打掃;7-Eleven會幫客戶送洗衣物;Lawson公司則針對日本高齡化社會,特別推出Lawon Plus便利超商,空間走道更寬,標誌字體更大,除了販售假牙清潔劑、染髮膏與掃墓花束等商品,也備有按摩椅與血壓計。

不僅如此,便利超商也試圖在大地震來襲時發揮作用,幫助政府緊急分送水源與物資。

有家暴或其他犯罪事件發生時,受害人也可到便利超商尋求保護,直到警察抵達。據統計,去年共有3.9萬人向便利超商求助。

就食材而言,日本超商的品質控管普遍優於美國。送貨卡車每天造訪超商十次,負責運送新鮮的便當、糕點、甜點與蔬菜,並帶走上架數小時後仍未賣出的生鮮食品。

香菸也是帶動便利商店銷售的一大助力。日本男性約四成會吸菸,是美國的兩倍。日本政府為了降低吸菸率,今夏推出可識別年齡的「智慧卡」,成人只能在販賣機購買香菸。不過,消費者並不買帳,紛紛轉到便利商店買菸。

這項法律自7月實施以來,便利商店的業績大幅攀升,而這波榮景其實在更早前就已形成。

日本連鎖店協會(JFA)理事海江田哲指出,便利超商在1990年代日本經濟衰退時蓬勃發展,趁著百業蕭條時擴張市占率。他說:「我們總能在不景氣時交出亮麗成績單。」


日本「軟實力」 征服全球

60年前,日本企圖以武力征服東亞鄰國,死傷慘重,終究沒能得逞。今天,不費一兵一卒,她竟在經濟衰退、政權更迭頻繁的情況下,讓世界重新愛上她,海外影響力之高,前所未見。

英國廣播公司(BBC)2008年的一項調查說,日本的全球正面形象排名第二(德國以些微差距領先,美國名列第七)。芝加哥對外關係委員會 (Chicago Council on Foreign Relations)的研究也指出,日本在亞洲的文化、經濟、外交和政治影響力,領先中國和南韓。

日本的製造能力和能源效率,各國無能出其右者。豐田已取代通用汽車(GM)成為世界第一大汽車製造商,世界上更有數百萬人是日本精彩動漫畫的大粉絲。

日本這個全球第二大經濟體,突然之間成了大家都還不習慣的「模範生」。首先,她從二次大戰的廢墟中迅速站起來,搖身而為科技創新大國,在邁向現代化和民主化的同時,始終保有本身的文化認同及傳統,不曾一刻失去自己的根。開發中國家正在研究學習她是怎麼辦到的。

發展經濟 保有文化傳統

另一方面,日本發展經濟有成,卻一直堅持保育環境,其他工業國家很想知道魚與熊掌如何得兼,紛紛在能源創新方面向日本取經。

從京都議定書、豐田省能車Prius到通俗文化,日本在各方面獨領風騷,扮演起更吃重的全球角色。《時代》雜誌說,她靠的是「經由魅力,而非脅迫,得償所願」的軟實力(soft power),而且魅力攻勢多路進擊,在全球留下更多的足印。

例如,就在金融海嘯來襲時,日本銀行業者剛走出自身長達十年的債務危機,三菱金融便忙不迭抱90億美元去救掙扎求生的摩根士丹利,野村集團砸20億美元收購雷曼兄弟的亞洲、歐洲和中東營運處所。

「日本公司」也大張旗鼓在非洲和亞洲各地設工廠及代表處。去年10月間,日本中央銀行同意從撥款給財務困窘的冰島等國應急。接著日本承諾借1,000億美元給國際貨幣基金(IMF),援助開發中國家。

日本把成功轉型做得漂亮,不再讓人覺得她只是單構面的工作狂「日本公司」。現在她在世人心目中,呈現的是多面的形象。

今天,外國人學習日文的興趣,比在所謂的泡沫經濟年頭還要強烈。2006年全球有約300萬人學習日文,比1990年多兩倍。更重要的是,外國人以前學日文是為了討生活,現在則是對日本文化懷有濃厚的興趣。日本計劃在世界各地廣設語言中心,推廣日文學習。

觀光大使 凱蒂貓挑大樑

2008年3月日本外務省任命小叮噹為第一位「卡通大使」,兩個月後,凱蒂貓又「出任」觀光大使。從兩位貓大使的任命案,可以看出日本在國外的形象,和通俗文化綁得多緊。

日本到底想成為什麼樣的全球領導者,距塵埃落定還遠。但有件事很清楚,那就是相對於中國引起的注意,日本人懂得鴨子划水之道,表面上不動聲色,檯面下舉足輕重,而且在某些領域的影響力與日俱增。(作者是自由撰稿人)


Tombow Pencil

Tombow Pencil Co.,Ltd. (株式会社トンボ鉛筆 Kabushiki-gaisha Tonbo Enpitsu?) is a Japanese manufacturer of pens and pencils and other stationery. The company was founded in 1913 and has since grown into an international business.

Brush pens

Traditional Japanese calligraphy is done with brush and ink. This is not particularly practical for office or school use. But one can now obtain "brush pens" (筆ペン fude pen?), such as Tombow's Fudenosuke (筆之助?). These pens have a soft, brushlike nib which provides a varying width mark, depending on angle and pressure.

External links


仕事耕具:

鉛筆を削るのにぴったり? トンボとビクトリノックスがコラボ 

トンボ鉛筆とビクトリノックスのコラボレーションモデルが登場した。スモールブレード/はさみ/ピンセットなど7つのツールを小指大の本体に収めた「VICTORINOX マルチツール」に、ロングセラー製品である「トンボ鉛筆 8900」のロゴをデザインした。 
2009年01月28日 20時24分 更新

 トンボ鉛筆とスイスに本拠地を置くナイフメーカー・ビクトリノックスのコラボレーションモデル「TOMBOW8900 VICTORINOX マルチツール」が登場した。スモールブレード/はさみ/ピンセットなどが1つになっており、価格は3150円。販売元はビクトリノックス・ジャパンで、全 国の直営ビクトリノックスショップや百貨店、専門店などで1月28日から購入できる。

ts_tom1.jpgts_tom2.jpg 「VICTORINOX マルチツール」に、トンボ鉛筆のロングセラー「8900」のロゴをデザインした。小指大の本体に7つのツールを格納する。(1)スモールブレード(2)つめやすり(3)はさみ(4)ピンセット(5)ツースピック(6)つめそうじ(7)キーリング

ts_tom3.jpg

 ビクトリノックスの創業125周年を記念したコラボレーションモデル「伝統企業シリーズ スイス×日本」の1つとして販売する。スモールブレード/つめやすり/はさみ/ピンセット/ツースピック/つめそうじ/キーリングの7つのツールを小指大 の本体に収めた「VICTORINOX マルチツール」に、ロングセラー製品である「トンボ鉛筆 8900」のロゴをデザインした。 

 「VICTORINOXが高い品質と堅実な知名度を保持していること、“小さな道具箱”がモノづくりの原点であることなどで、当社の企業ブランド 活動と共鳴していることからコラボレーションに合意した」(トンボ鉛筆)。閉じたときのサイズは18×58.5×8.5ミリ(幅×長さ×厚み)。

 「伝統企業シリーズ スイス×日本」では、トンボ鉛筆のほか、「京すだれ川崎」「鈴木茂兵衛商店」「大幸薬品」「常盤堂雷おこし本舗」「永谷園」「マルカン酢」「森下仁丹」の7社とのコラボレーションモデルも販売する。

2009年1月26日 星期一

大頭貼業

日本大頭貼 男士止步

編譯鄭曉蘭/特譯

日 本的照相貼紙機器「大頭貼」不僅曾在國內掀起熱潮,還一度風靡全球,不過隨著手機照相功能的普及,營業額也隨之大幅滑落。如今,日本的大頭貼業者為救亡圖 存,紛紛推出標榜「美肌」、「小顏」功能的大頭貼機種,同時設立「男士止步」的大頭貼專區,讓女性免於偷窺、偷拍的恐懼,盡情享受大頭貼的樂趣。

日本大型遊樂場的大頭貼專區,越來越常見「男士止步」的標示。大阪北區的娛樂設施「梅田JOYPOLIS」,其中的大頭貼專區門口就有一個斗大的標示寫著「本專區限女性或情侶使用,禁止男性單獨入場」。

這是因為,隨著大頭貼機種高畫質、高科技化,同時也走向大型包廂化,結果卻讓有心人士趁女性顧客拍照時偷窺或偷拍。為了營造一個讓女性感到舒適安心的大頭貼空間,業者乾脆禁止男性入場。

日本第一台大頭貼於1995年問世,隨後在高中女生之間爆紅,並在全球掀起熱潮。但是,隨著新鮮感消失及照相功能手機的普及,曾在2002年度締造日幣605億圓(約台幣226億元)營業額的大頭貼,到了2007年度已驟降至日幣307億圓(約台幣115億元)。

「美容功能」相片媲美明星

除 了「男士止步」之外,大頭貼業者另一項再掀流行熱潮的法寶,就是連高中女生自己都大喊「詐欺」的「美容功能」。拍完大頭貼之後,液晶螢幕上會出現「大 眼」、「小臉」、「美白」、「美肌」等各種修片功能,讓拍出來的大頭貼媲美偶像明星,連自己都認不出來。有些大頭貼專區還提供女警制服或女巫服等變裝服 務,同時陳列各種造型假髮以及化妝品,這一切都是為了讓日本年輕女性重回大頭貼的懷抱。

(取材自朝日新聞)

2009年1月24日 星期六

三具足

完美無缺。警世通言˙卷三十˙金明池吳清逢愛愛:「好個十相具足的小娘子,恨不曾訪問他居止姓名。」

みつぐそく 3 【三具足】

仏前に置く香炉・花瓶(けびよう)・燭台の三つの法具。三具。

三具足(みつぐそく・さんぐそく)は、仏具の呼称の一つ。香炉燭台(火立)・花立各一つずつで一組となる仏具の事。

  • 本尊に向かって左側に花立、真ん中に香炉、右側に灯立を置く。ちなみに五具足の場合は、香炉を中心に燭台一対、花立をその外に一対置く。左右対称の形になる。
  • 大きさは香炉が直径約5cm~30cm、灯立が高さ約8cm~90cm、花立が直径約6cm~35cm程度とさまざまである。
  • 真鍮製が主だが、最近ではステンレス製などの現代様式の物も販売されている。真鍮にメッキを掛けた物や、焼き色を付けた物もある。
  • 浄土真宗においては、平時の荘厳の仕方。
  • 浄土真宗では各派で仏具の形が異なる。浄土真宗本願寺派では、焼き色をつけた燭台を用い、真宗大谷派真宗仏光寺派真宗高田派では鶴亀燭台(亀の上に鶴が乗った形)を用いる。花瓶(かひんと発音、花立の事。)や香炉も、宗派によって形状に違いがある。
  • 真宗大谷派の紋の入った正式な花瓶は、置き方に決まりがある。(鰭を正面に向け、牡丹紋を外側に向け八藤紋は内側に向けて置く。)

Japan’s Aso Agrees to Sales Tax Deal in Bid to Heal LDP Rift

Japan’s Aso Agrees to Sales Tax Deal in Bid to Heal LDP Rift

By Sachiko Sakamaki and Takashi Hirokawa

Jan. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Japan’s Prime Minister Taro Aso agreed to delay raising the country’s 5 percent sales tax unless the economy recovers, in an effort to heal a rift within the ruling party ahead of elections later this year.

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party said today it will submit a bill next year that aims to raise the consumption tax by 2011 without committing to that date. Aso maintains the measure is needed to balance the budget.

Lawmakers within the LDP have joined members of the Democratic Party of Japan in opposing Aso’s proposal, saying it would hurt consumption during a deepening recession. A former cabinet minister quit the ruling part last week and called for the resignation of Aso, whose approval ratings have tumbled since taking office in September.

“Our concerns have pretty much been wiped away,” Yasuhisa Shiozaki, a former Chief Cabinet Secretary who was critical of the plan, said after the LDP meeting today. “The original plan gave the impression the sales tax absolutely would be raised in fiscal 2011.”

Rising unemployment and falling wages have helped send Aso’s approval rating below 20 percent, threatening to end more than 50 years of almost unbroken LDP rule ahead of elections that must be called by September. Former Financial Services Minister Yoshimi Watanabe quit the party last week.

Falling Exports

A government report today showed exports fell by a record last month, signaling companies will need to fire more workers.

The world’s second-largest economy will shrink 1.8 percent in the year ending March 31 and 2 percent next year before recovering to expand 1.5 percent in the period through March 2011, according to Bank of Japan estimates.

Aso, who is scheduled to make a policy speech on Jan. 26, is struggling to get a stimulus package through parliament that includes making 2 trillion yen ($22.4 billion) in cash payments to households.

“Why are they wasting their time on these arcane political intricacies?” said Richard Jerram, chief economist at Macquarie Securities Ltd. in Tokyo. “What they really need to be doing is looking for measures to offset the damage from exports. They need to do something to boost domestic demand.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Takashi Hirokawa in Tokyo at thirokawa@bloomberg.net; Sachiko Sakamaki in Tokyo at Ssakamaki1@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: January 22, 2009 01:32 EST

GDP shrinking much faster than any other developed one

Japan

Early in, early out

Jan 22nd 2009 | TOKYO
From The Economist print edition

An economy not hit directly by the financial storm is shrinking much faster than any other developed one


NO EVENT is seared upon Japan’s recent memory like the bursting of the country’s credit-inflated bubble in land and share prices after 1990. Yet, since the autumn, the speed with which Japan’s industrial output and exports have fallen almost certainly signals a slump of unprecedented severity, making Japan’s several post-bubble recessions look mild. In 1998, the worst year, the economy shrank by 2%. Most economists think it contracted by more than that in the last three months of 2008 alone. Goldman Sachs expects GDP to fall by 3.8% this year.

After six years of growth, the longest uninterrupted post-war run, Japan entered a new recession as early as the second quarter of 2008. But in the final couple of months of the year, what at first was a fairly gentle decline morphed into something far worse than that experienced even by countries at the centre of the credit storm (see chart).

In November the value of exports fell by 27% year on year. The picture only worsened in December with a year-on-year fall of 35%. Recession in the United States was the main cause, with exports there down by 36.9% from a year earlier. In turn, the global slump has also knocked supply chains in Asia, sending Japan’s exports to China down by 35.5% in December, with exports to Asia’s “tigers” (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan) falling by even more than those to America.

Exports account for almost half of Japan’s manufacturing output, which as a consequence is seeing its biggest falls since records began: November’s output was down by 13% on a year earlier. Orders for machine tools in December, an early indicator of things to come, were 72% lower than a year before. Hiroshi Shiraishi of BNP Paribas reckons that by December industrial output had already fallen back to its post-bubble low in 2001, wiping out the gains from six years of what had been thought to be a solid recovery. Before the slump is over, Mr Shiraishi expects production to slide back to levels last seen in 1987.

It has not helped that the export demand that drove Japan’s economic recovery after 2002 was narrowly based on cars and consumer technology, industries that have fallen more than most. Carmakers, for instance, are roughly halving production, with consequences for makers of steel, chips and chemicals.

Perhaps the most unexpected element of the slump is the knock that domestic sentiment is taking. After all, Japan had none of the credit excesses of America and much of Europe: rather than borrow in recent years, Japan’s companies have paid off debts, while households sit on a pile of savings. The financial system is largely untainted by toxic securities and bad debts, and though the regional banks look set to start asking for public funds, the big city banks are some way from needing to do that. Still, consumer demand, never strong during the six-year recovery, has weakened fast. Year-on-year car sales are down by more than a fifth; department-store sales have fallen by nearly a tenth. On January 20th the Cabinet Office released its consumer-confidence survey for December, which marked its third consecutive all-time low. The survey points to how badly the slump has spread to services.

Reuters The inducements aren’t working

To cap it all, Japan now faces the return of a ghost it thought it had banished: deflation. By the summer, prices will be falling again. To the extent that this marks a decline in energy prices since last year, it is helpful. But another persistent fall in prices would be a sign of policy failure. In December the Bank of Japan was forced to cut interest rates almost to zero, ie, back to where they last were in 2006. On January 22nd it announced expanded plans to buy commercial paper and even corporate bonds. Takatoshi Ito of Tokyo University, until recently a government adviser, thinks the bank should be doing much more, including making a clear commitment to targeting a positive rate of inflation.

There is cause to temper the pessimism. Households still have their savings. And bank lending to companies is on the rise, though a good chunk of this is taking over from credit once supplied by capital markets, which have dried up.

Crucially, adjustments are happening swiftly in areas that beleaguered companies tackled only slowly during the last slump, such as bloated workforces and excessive capacity. Bankruptcies of “zombie” companies long kept alive on cheap credit and an undervalued currency have soared now that credit is harder to get and the yen has risen to a fairer valuation on a trade-weighted basis. And at the end of a decade in which much more use was made of contract and temporary workers, companies are now laying these off fast. In order to reduce inventories, production is also being slashed. This marks a new flexibility in Japan’s economy.

Unemployment, now 3.9%, may head back towards the post-bubble high of 5.5%. At the same time, the structure of the labour force may lessen the pain. As the economy recovered, many companies asked workers from Japan’s huge generation of baby-boomers to stay on past retirement age. Plenty of these will now simply retire with their pensions. Swift adjustments to workforces and inventories mean that Japan may recover sooner than other rich economies.

But when, and how robust, that recovery will be is another matter. However fast companies are cutting capacity that once served Americans’ debt-fuelled consumption, Japan’s whole economic structure is geared towards meeting external demand. That post-war model in Japan is now bust. So too is the political system that built and guided it: after half a century of almost unbroken power, the Liberal Democratic Party, having lost its purpose, is threatened with annihilation at the polls in the next few months.

Ageing population, decrepit politics

Political dysfunction has now become perhaps the biggest issue for the economy. Policymakers should be debating how to foster domestic demand in an ageing and shrinking society—for instance, by dismantling regulations in health care and services for the old that benefit producers over users. Instead, the government is locked in a sterile fight, within its own ranks as well as with the opposition, over a relatively small stimulus worth ¥2 trillion ($22 billion), much of which will be pocketed by consumers, not spent. Masaaki Kanno of JPMorgan Securities thinks that a stimulus four times bigger, designed to raise productivity, is needed to counter the slump in demand.

The government’s timidity is encouraged in part by a national debt that soared during the post-bubble years: the ratio of net debt to GDP stands at over 90%. Yet interest rates and so the cost of servicing the debt remain very low; and almost all the debt-holders are Japanese, not flighty foreigners. The risks lie in favour of more vigorous action.

The same applies to the central bank, whose natural caution is reinforced by the absence of political direction or debate. For instance, a case might be made for the Bank of Japan, as well as clearly targeting inflation, to buy equities, so boosting commercial banks’ capital, a big part of which is made up of shareholdings whose value continued to lurch down this week. So here is the irony: whereas the rest of the rich world, starting with America, desperately seeks to avoid Japan’s experience in the post-bubble years, Japan today is condemned by its own dismal politics to drag along behind everyone else.

2009年1月23日 星期五

Japan Works Hard to Help Immigrants Find Jobs

Japan Works Hard to Help Immigrants Find Jobs

Population-Loss Fears Prompt New Stance

Paulino and Lidiane Onuma, Brazilians of Japanese descent, and their daughters Juliana, left, and Leticia, are reluctantly heading back to Sao Paulo next month. Lidiane has lost her job, and Paulino's ends next week.
Paulino and Lidiane Onuma, Brazilians of Japanese descent, and their daughters Juliana, left, and Leticia, are reluctantly heading back to Sao Paulo next month. Lidiane has lost her job, and Paulino's ends next week. (By Blaine Harden -- The Washington Post)

Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 23, 2009; Page A01

UEDA, Japan -- The last thing that aging Japan can afford to lose is young people. Yet as the global economic crisis flattens demand for Japanese cars and electronic goods, thousands of youthful, foreign-born factory workers are getting fired, pulling their children out of school and flying back to where they came from.

Paulino and Lidiane Onuma have sold their car and bought plane tickets for Sao Paulo, Brazil. They are going back next month with their two young daughters, both of whom were born here in this factory town. His job making heavy machinery for automobile plants ends next week. She lost her job making box lunches with black beans and spicy rice for the city's Brazilian-born workers, most of whom have also been dismissed and are deciding whether to leave Japan.

"We have no desire to go home," said Paulino Onuma, 29, who has lived here for 12 years and earned about $50,000 a year, far more than he says he could make in Brazil. "We are only going back because of the situation."

That situation -- the extreme exposure of immigrant families to job loss and their sudden abandonment of Japan -- has alarmed the government in Tokyo and pushed it to create programs that would make it easier for jobless immigrants to remain here in a country that has traditionally been wary of foreigners, especially those without work.

"Our goal is to get them to stay," said Masahiko Ozeki, who is in charge of an interdepartmental office that was established this month in the cabinet of Prime Minister Taro Aso. "As a government, we have not done anything like this before."

Japanese-language courses, vocational training programs and job counseling are being put together, Ozeki said, so immigrants can find work throughout the Japanese economy. There is a shortage of workers here, especially in health care and other services for the elderly. So far, government funding for these emerging programs is limited -- slightly more than $2 million, far less than will be needed to assist the tens of thousands of foreign workers who are losing jobs and thinking about giving up on Japan. But Ozeki said the prime minister will soon ask parliament for considerably more money -- exactly how much is still being figured out -- as part of a major economic stimulus package to be voted on early this year.

The government's effort to keep jobless foreigners from leaving the country is "revolutionary," according to Hidenori Sakanaka, former head of the Tokyo Immigration Bureau and now director of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute, a research group in Tokyo.

"Japan has a long history of rejecting foreign residents who try to settle here," he said. "Normally, the response of the government would have been to encourage these jobless people to just go home. I wouldn't say that Japan as a country has shifted its gears to being an immigrant country, but when we look back on the history of this country, we may see that this was a turning point."

Sakanaka said the government's decision will send a much-needed signal to prospective immigrants around the world that, if they choose to come to Japan to work, they will be treated with consideration, even in hard economic times.

There is a growing sense among Japanese politicians and business leaders that large-scale immigration may be the only way to head off a demographic calamity that seems likely to cripple the world's second-largest economy.

No country has ever had fewer children or more elderly as a percentage of its total population. The number of children has fallen for 27 consecutive years. A record 22 percent of the population is older than 65, compared with about 12 percent in the United States. If those trends continue, in 50 years, the population of 127 million will have shrunk by a third; in a century, by two-thirds.

Japan will have two retirees for every three workers by 2060, a burden that could bankrupt pension and health-care systems.

Demographers have been noisily fretting about those numbers for years, but only in the past year have they grabbed the attention of important parts of this country's power structure.

A group of 80 politicians in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party said last summer that Japan needs to welcome 10 million immigrants over the next 50 years. It said the goal of government policy should not be just to "get" immigrants, but to "nurture" them and their families with language and vocational training, and to encourage them to become naturalized citizens of Japan.

The country's largest business federation, the traditionally conservative Nippon Keidanren, said in the fall that "we cannot wait any longer to aggressively welcome necessary personnel." It pointed to U.N. calculations that Japan will need 17 million foreigners by 2050 to maintain the population it had in 2005.

Among highly developed countries, Japan has always ranked near the bottom in the percentage of foreign-born residents. Just 1.7 percent are foreign-born here, compared with about 12 percent in the United States.

The Japanese public remains deeply suspicious of immigrants. In an interview last year, then-Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda suggested that the prospect of large-scale immigration was politically toxic.

"There are people who say that if we accept more immigrants, crime will increase," Fukuda said. "Any sudden increase in immigrants causing social chaos [and] social unrest is a result that we must avoid by all means."

Here in Ueda, a city of about 125,000 people in the Nagano region, a recent survey found that residents worried that the city's 5,000 immigrants were responsible for crime and noise pollution.

"The feeling of the city is that if foreigners have lost their jobs, then they should leave the country," said Kooji Horinouti, a Brazilian immigrant of Japanese descent who works for the Bank of Brazil here and heads a local immigrant group.

It is not just the residents of Ueda. The Japanese government, until this month, had done little to train foreign-born workers in the country's language or to introduce them to life outside the factory towns where most of them work, according to Sakanaka, the immigration expert.

By contrast, the German government in recent years has offered up to 900 hours of subsidized language training to immigrants, along with other programs designed to integrate them into German society.

Japan had moved much, much more slowly.

It changed its highly restrictive immigration laws in 1990 to make it relatively easy for foreigners of Japanese descent to live here and work. The change generated the greatest response from Brazil, which has the world's largest population of immigrant Japanese and their descendants.

About 500,000 Brazilian workers and their families -- who have Japanese forebears but often speak only Portuguese -- have moved to Japan in the past two decades.

They have lived, however, in relatively isolated communities, clustered near factories. Because the government hired few Portuguese-speaking teachers for nearby public schools, many Brazilians enrolled their children in private Portuguese-language schools. With the mass firings of Brazilian workers in recent months, many of those schools have closed.

Paulino and Lidiane Onuma sent their 6-year-old daughter, Juliana, to the Novo Damasco school here in Ueda, where she has not learned to speak Japanese.

Her parents, too, speak and read little Japanese, although they moved to Japan as teenagers. There has been no government-sponsored program to teach them the language or how to negotiate life outside their jobs.

"Japan is finally realizing that it does not have a system for receiving and instructing non-Japanese speakers," said Sakanaka, the immigration policy expert. "It is late, of course, but still, it is important that the government has come to see this is a problem."

Had they known there would be language and job-training programs in Ueda, the Onuma family might not have sold their car and bought those tickets for Sao Paulo.

"If those programs existed now," Lidiane Onuma said, "I might have made a different choice."


Japan launches satellites, eyes space business"息吹"號

日本發射衛星監控地球氣候變化
火箭升空
“息吹”號將改進對地球溫室氣體排放的監測

氣象衛星由日本火箭發射升空,將幫助科學家瞭解和監控地球氣候變化情況。

搭載著"息吹"號人造衛星和7顆小型衛星的日本火箭23日在鹿兒島縣種子島宇宙中心發射升空。

"息吹"號是一顆重量為兩噸的人造衛星,將在距離地球666公里的太空圍繞地球飛行,為大氣層中溫室氣體的密度和所在位置繪圖。

"息吹"號的這一監測任務為期五年,將確認和監查二氧化碳的來源,幫助監測類似"京都協議"這樣的國際公約和協議的執行情況。

日本太空署說,"息吹"號全球監測溫室氣體衛星將為防止氣候變暖做出貢獻。

據這一監測項目負責人介紹,目前全球各地有大約280個地面監測站,監測溫室氣體水平。

這些檢測站大都在歐洲、日本和美國。世界上很多地方都沒有設立這樣的監測站。

而"息吹"號則能對整個地球表面的兩大主要溫室氣體---二氧化碳和甲烷進行測量。

美國宇航局將在今年二月發射另一顆溫室氣體監測衛星,找到地球表面二氧化碳排放和被吸收的地點。


Japan launches satellites, eyes space business

Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:02pm EST


TOKYO, Jan 23 (Reuters) - Japan launched a satellite on Friday to monitor greenhouse gases along with seven smaller satellites in a mission that could boost business for the country's cash-hungry space programme.

The H-2A rocket, carrying the biggest number of satellites ever for a Japanese rocket, took off from the tiny island of Tanegashima 1,000 km (620 miles) south of Tokyo, after a delay of two days because of poor weather.

The main satellite will enable scientists to calculate the density of carbon dioxide and methane from 56,000 locations on the Earth's surface, which Japanese officials hope will contribute to global efforts to tackle climate change.

The mission is also a test for Japan as it sets its sights on the satellite-launch business in the face of competition from Europe, the United States and Russia, as well as newer entrants such as China and India. (Reporting by Chisa Fujioka)



関係者が、将来への貢献も視野に入れて協力
いただいている結果だと思います。改めて
皆様に感謝致します。未来の地球環境に貢献する「いぶき」。私も、将来プロジェクト


2009年1月21日 星期三

Yoshiko Shinohara

Women to Watch

Japan's Shinohara Adapts Style to Economic Trends

As Temp Industry Takes a Hit, Executive Looks for Openings


How is "the mother of Japan's temp industry" wading through the current global recession, which has prompted the export-reliant Japan to cut production at the fastest pace in decades, resulting in tens of thousands of jobless temp workers? "My style is called 'hermit crab management,' " says Yoshiko Shinohara, president of Temp Holdings Co. Ms. Shinohara set up a temp-service agency in Tokyo three decades ago when such a service was hardly heard of in Japan, a nation that was once proud of lifetime employment. Ms. Shinohara, recently named one of The Wall Street Journal Asia's women to watch, says spending ...

JULY 12, 2004
Click here to find out more!


Yoshiko Shinohara
President, Tempstaff, Japan

Yoshiko Shinohara knows something about adversity. She lost her father at the age of 8, her marriage broke up in her mid-20s, and a decade later she launched a temporary work agency in a tiny one-room apartment in central Tokyo with a grubstake of $9,000. Today her company, Tempstaff, is a $1.5 billion concern, and Shinohara, who never went to university, is praised in the press as a gutsy female entrepreneur who made it big.

JULY 12, 2004

What sparked the entrepreneurial itch in Shinohara when most of her peers in the 1960s preferred to master the intricacies of the Japanese tea ceremony? Part of it was travel. After her divorce, a curious Shinohara studied English and secretarial skills in Britain, then worked in Australia for a marketing company. She saw women managers thriving and was struck by how temporary-work agencies opened doors for them. "It was very impressive for me to see women breezing through their work in Europe and Australia," she says.

In 1973, Shinohara returned to Japan and at the age of 38 decided to launch her temp agency. It wasn't easy. She didn't know the first thing about running a startup. Still, what she lacked in managerial knowhow she more than made up for in drive. She started making calls to foreign and Japanese companies, sometimes as many as 20 per day. Business was so glacial at first that she taught English at night to pay the rent on her apartment, which doubled as corporate headquarters.

By the late-1980s, Tempstaff had established itself. Paradoxically, Japan's stretch of stagnation in the 1990s was a godsend, as companies hired more part-time workers to avoid the high cost of permanent employees. That trend has continued. In 2003 alone, the number of temps soared 21.8%, to 2.13 million workers -- 2.5 times as many as five years before. Today, Tempstaff serves 59,000 clients, employs 1,200, and expects profits to rise 4.5%, to $80 million, in the fiscal year that ended in March.

Now nearing 70, Shinohara has lost none of her enthusiasm. Every morning by 8 a.m. she's at company headquarters, now in a smart high-rise in central Tokyo. Her next mission: promote expansion to new areas. "Specialization in labor is constantly advancing," she says, "especially in the fields of medicine, education, and IT." Japan is changing, and Shinohara will change with it.

2009年1月20日 星期二

Toyota Names Toyoda President

Toyota Names Toyoda President After Annual Sales Drop (Update1)

By Naoko Fujimura

Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Toyota Motor Corp., Asia’s biggest automaker, named Akio Toyoda, the grandson of the company’s founder, as president after reporting the first drop in annual vehicle sales in 10 years.

Toyoda will succeed Katsuaki Watanabe, who will become vice chairman, in June, the automaker said in a statement today. The company’s vehicle sales slipped 4 percent to 8.972 million last year, it said separately.

Toyoda, the first member of the founding family in charge since 1995, will inherit a company expecting its first operating loss in 71 years. Still, Toyota may have ended General Motors Corp.’s 77-year run as the world’s largest automaker, as the Detroit-based company is on life-support with loans from the U.S. government.

“Toyoda is the best one to lead the automaker,” said Hitoshi Yamamoto, chief executive officer of Tokyo-based Fortis Asset Management Japan Co., which manages $5.5 billion in Japanese equities. “Morale in the company is low and the return of the family will help in the crisis.”

Toyota gained 2.3 percent to 3,100 yen at the close of trading in Tokyo. The stock dropped 52 percent last year.

Toyoda’s Challenge

Toyoda, 52, will take over as the carmaker’s two largest markets, the U.S. and Japan, are plummeting, forcing Toyota to reduce inventories by halting production. The company plans to slash at least 5,000 temporary workers in the two countries.

Fluent in English, Toyoda graduated from Tokyo’s Keio University with a law degree in 1979. In 1982, he received a master’s degree in business administration from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts. He joined Toyota two years later.

After factory and finance jobs in Japan, he was assigned to make Toyota’s Japanese sales office more efficient. In 1996, Toyoda was the project leader for a service called G-Book that provides traffic updates. When directors declined to fund a prototype, Toyoda paid with $2,000 of his own money, according to the company. The project was a success.

By 1998, Toyoda was vice president of Toyota’s venture with GM in Fremont, California, producing Corollas for Toyota and Geo Prizms for GM.

U.S. Market

Toyoda’s first crisis as president will likely be the U.S. As the world’s largest economy contracts in 2009, auto sales are forecast to fall to between 10 million and 10.5 million this year from 13.2 million in 2008, according to IHS Global Insight. Last year’s total was the lowest in 16 years.

“No one knows how bad the market will be,” said Koichi Ogawa, chief portfolio manager at Daiwa SB Investments Ltd. in Tokyo, which manages $28 billion.

North American sales of Toyota- and Lexus-brand cars fell 13 percent to 2.44 million vehicles last year, and European sales slipped 10 percent to 1.12 million. China and the Middle East were the two fastest growing areas. The automaker boosted sales in China by 17 percent to 585,000 and those in the Middle East by 22 percent to 59,000 units.

GM will report its vehicle sales for last year at 9 a.m. local time on Jan. 21. Toyota topped GM in sales by about 395,000 in the first nine months of last year. In 2007, GM’s sales surpassed Toyota’s by about 3,100 units. The tally includes Toyota’s Daihatsu Motor Co. and Hino Motors Ltd. units.

To contact the reporter on this story: Naoko Fujimura in Tokyo at nfujimura@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: January 20, 2009 01:59 EST

2009年1月19日 星期一

Kansai International Airport services dropped

Airlines to drop Kansai services

THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2009/1/19


OSAKA--Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways will slash or suspend flights on nine domestic routes in and out of Kansai International Airport in fiscal 2009, sources said.

The airlines will switch their focus to Osaka International Airport, which has higher seat occupancy rates, they said. U.S.-based Northwest Airlines will also suspend flights between Kansai and Detroit and Saipan from March.

The second spate of cuts to Kansai airport services follows a round of reductions and suspensions introduced last autumn. Airport revenue is expected to be severely impacted by the scaleback in operations, the sources added.

JAL will reduce or suspend flights on five routes to and from Aomori and four cities in Hokkaido, the sources said. ANA will take similar measures on four routes to and from Haneda in Tokyo, Kagoshima, Kochi and Matsuyama.(IHT/Asahi: January 19,2009)

2009年1月18日 星期日

EDITORIAL: Gender-equal society

2009/1/16

Ten years have passed since the basic law for a gender-equal society was enacted. This landmark legislation was aimed at creating a society in which both women and men can demonstrate their full potential. To what extent has the law's ideal become a reality?
According to the Cabinet Office, women account for a mere 9.4 percent of Lower House members. Compared with other nations, the figure is abysmally low. As far as policymaking is concerned, Japan is nowhere near to being a gender-equal society.

The awareness of men is slowly changing, however. The number of men who believe women should not give up their careers to raise children or for other reasons is rising. Still, when it comes to pitching in with housework and childcare, regardless of whether their partners work or not, on average, men spend only about 30 to 40 minutes performing such chores daily.
Apparently, they understand the general principles of washing dishes or changing diapers, but find it hard to get their hands wet.

Meantime, the percentage of nonregular employees, including part-time and temporary workers, is now higher among women in their 30s and older--exactly the time of life when many of them must care for their children. In fact, among women in their 40s and older, a higher percentage of women are nonregular workers than are full-time workers.
The truth is, it is hard for any middle-aged or older women to find stable employment.
So it is obvious that Japan has a long way to go before it can be called a gender-equal society under the law.

But that doesn't mean we should give up.

The law aims to eliminate gender gaps in various areas of life, thus resulting in equality. But that is not all it can do. The nation's trend toward having fewer children could in fact be reversed, for example. It is a fact that birthrates are proportionately higher in countries that provide good working environments for women and where men actively take on housework.
Following the spirit of the law, local governments run centers to promote gender equality and women's centers, places that have served both as education centers and counseling bases for residents.

Last fall, the government's Council for Gender Equality called for a re-examination of the roles of such centers and requested local governments to work on solutions to the concrete problems that face residents. Few women have stepped up to take on roles as leaders in their local communities and there are few opportunities for them to fully demonstrate their abilities.
In advanced approaches, some centers are organizing classes for single mothers to help them brush up computer skills, for example. Others hold cooking lessons for men to help them lessen their dependence on women performing such everyday tasks. Other centers are running successful programs that promote gender equality in cooperation with nonprofit organizations.
Morioka Josei Center, in Morioka, started a lecture series for aspiring female entrepreneurs in December. Fourteen women in their 20s to 50s are attending.

One, a homemaker in her 40s, wants to open a minshuku family-run inn serving organic foods in the city. "I want to make it an inn that only serves breakfast, similar to the kind I learned about when my husband was transferred overseas," she said. Another woman said she wants to start her own business using her qualifications as a certified social insurance and labor consultant, skills she gained while working as a dispatch worker.

Their ambitions are an example of what power women can offer to energize communities. Although economic troubles have led some local governments to scale down such centers, we must not miss the opportunity to take advantage of the skills women possess. More than ever, the nation needs such centers for women to expand their presence and effectiveness in everyday life.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Jan. 15(IHT/Asahi: January 16,2009)

Students reflect on love, hope and corruption

2009/1/17

A tanka poem by Natsuki Araya, a third-year industrial high school student in Aomori Prefecture, goes: "Combing my hair, which reeks of iron/ I realize I've indeed become a craftswoman." Kentaro Tamori, also a third-year student at an agricultural high school in Hokkaido, penned this one: "The farmland that was my playground when I was little/ Is now a workplace/ For my father and me."

Around this season every year, I look forward to receiving my copy of "Gendai Gakusei Hyakunin Isshu" (100 contemporary tanka poems by 100 students) from Toyo University. These poems capture the essence of youth--a period that passes all too quickly. The university has been publishing this annual poem collection for 22 years; this year, it received 63,000 entries from around the nation.

The subjects of the selected poems vary, but love and romance are obviously on the minds of many teenage authors.

Yui Miyashita, a second-year senior high school student, wrote: "Looking up in the dictionary/ The meaning of kanji characters for your name/ I bookmark the page in my heart." Kana Sakakibara, also in her second year: "I take super-neat notes in class/ Hoping you'll ask to borrow them."

Sometimes, the heart is ruffled by feelings of loneliness or anxiety. Hiromichi Ando, a first-year senior high school student: "Life or death/ Takes only one kanji to write/ Under the harvest moon/ I stand alone in a field of pampas grass."

Miku Kamada, a third-year senior high school student: "I don't know why/ But I get the feeling/ That I shouldn't find my bluebird of happiness."

But the teens keep trying. Kanon Suzuki, a third-year junior high school student, wrote: "Sprinting 100 meters at full speed/ Pares away everything I don't need." Mana Murasaki, a first-year senior high school student: "I'm not as close to my limits as I think/ So why not keep running until I hit them." Murasaki is a girl, but she wrote boku, the first-person singular that is typically used by boys. The effect is surprisingly refreshing.

There are things these young people want to say to adults, in fact telling them off. For Keisuke Goda, a third-year senior high school student, it's this: "People knew all too well/ They were selling contaminated rice/ But which was more contaminated/ The rice or their hearts?"
And Kaori Matsumura, a first-year senior high school student, had this message for politicians: "Let's have an Obama sensation in Japan, too/ Everyone is waiting for a prime minister they can trust."

Yes, we can. Everyone, including these future voters, is waiting for hope to light up society.
--The Asahi Shimbun, Jan. 16(IHT/Asahi: January 17,2009)

2009年1月11日 星期日

Tourists welcome again at Tsukiji tuna auctions

Tourists welcome again at Tsukiji tuna auctions

BY RIKA NEMOTO, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2009/1/12


A temporary ban on visitors to early morning tuna auctions at Tokyo's Tsukiji fish market will end, allowing the public to again observe the auctions which have become a popular attraction for foreign tourists from Jan. 19.

The market's auction floor has been off-limits since Dec. 15 because of congestion at the market during the busy year-end period, but also partly in response to bad behavior from some visitors.

The Tokyo metropolitan government, which manages the market in Chuo Ward, had tentatively set the ban through Saturday. Officials had been discussing with market workers whether to reopen the tuna auction floor.

Partly due to a number of accidents involving vehicles and tourists, many wholesalers and middle traders wanted the ban maintained, arguing that "lay people shouldn't be where professionals work."

Many were concerned about visitors' bad manners, such as touching tuna or using camera flashes while taking photographs.

On the other hand, some wholesalers and middle traders were in favor of making the market's wholesale area open again, with some acknowledging that many visitors had traveled long distances to see the market, while others were worried that the market would "no longer be lively if people stop visiting."

Before the ban, as many as 500 people a day, including foreign tourists, visited the market to observe tuna auctions, which start around 5:30 a.m.

At a time when the number of foreign tourists visiting the country is in decline because of the yen's appreciation, the Tokyo government decided to lift the ban and again offer a space on the tuna auction floor for the public to watch.

At the entrance of the market, which is officially called the Tokyo Metropolitan Central Wholesale Market, information on the dos and don'ts for visitors will be posted in four languages.

Security guards will be deployed on the auction floor, where leaflets on acceptable behavior will be distributed at its entrance.

If the visitors' area is overcrowded, the number of people allowed in will be limited temporarily, according to metropolitan government officials.(IHT/Asahi: January 12,2009)

日本經濟的汽車出口癮

WSJ
2009年 01月 06日 11:12
日本經濟的汽車出口癮


田汽車公司(Toyota Motor Corp.)的命運在很大程度上就是日本經濟的命運。

在近些年經濟出現低迷時﹐日本一直依賴汽車業來抵消其他行業的下滑。而汽車生產商延續十年的成功﹐尤其是豐田汽車對通用汽車公司(General Motors Corp.)全球最大汽車生產商地位的挑戰﹐使得全球汽車銷售陷入低迷之際﹐汽車業成了日本最大的出口行業。

根據摩根大通(J.P. Morgan)的資料﹐汽車業佔美國國內生產總值(GDP)的比例僅為0.8%﹐而日本這一比例為3.2%。

Associated Press
豐田的汽車展廳
日 本在依賴願意借貸又愛車的美國人方面﹐這些年也有增無減。全球汽車及汽車零部件出口值在不到十年中翻了一番﹔截至去年3月份的財政年度中﹐日本的出口額為 9,400億美元﹐其中汽車業就佔了五分之一強。豐田汽車三分之一的銷售額和本田汽車(Honda Motor Co.)二分之一的銷售額均來自美國市場。

因此國內外銷售額疲軟引發的裁員和減產帶來嚴重衝擊﹐尤其是在日本汽車業的中心東海(Tokai)地區。

當地人口佔日本1.28億總人口的12%左右﹔得益於汽車出口增長﹐該地區在亞洲金融危機和互聯網泡沫破裂期間均避免了國內其他地區遭遇的失業問題。

但就目前而言﹐上述經驗幾乎無法對當地執政者提供任何安慰。豐田汽車國內工廠聚集區愛知縣就計劃雇佣臨時工來做檢查公路等零工﹐以抵消裁員的影響。

底特律的姐妹城市豐田城(Toyota City)擁有40萬名居民﹐76,000個汽車業相關工作崗位。預計該市下一財年的企業稅收入將比今年的4.9億美元大幅減少十分之九。該市因此削減了公共工程支出。

但汽車生產商的裁員減產可能只是剛剛開始。日本主要的八家汽車廠商已經將計劃產量減少了220萬輛﹐並裁減了11,000多名合同工。豐田11月份宣佈的減產計劃佔全國整體減產量的近一半。

James Simms

2009年1月9日 星期五

Ministry vows own probe on accidents



日本的某些制度
必須直追先進國

BY ATSUSHI MATSUKAWA, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN2009/1/10

Under fire for not swiftly looking into an elevator accident that killed a teenager in 2006, the infrastructure ministry has decided to immediately conduct its own investigations separately from police in future serious incidents, sources said.

Despite its jurisdiction over elevator safety, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism has generally refrained from examining elevators that police seized as part of their investigations.

The change in the ministry's stance follows the suffocation death of high school student Hirosuke Ichikawa in June 2006.

Ichikawa, then 16, was exiting an elevator at a housing complex in Tokyo's Minato Ward when it suddenly began to rise, trapping him between the cage floor and the ceiling.

The Metropolitan Police Department seized the machinery as evidence and has since investigated the case on suspicion of professional negligence resulting in death.

But in the two and a half years since the incident, it still has not been able to press criminal responsibility.

Ichikawa's bereaved family complained about the ministry's failure to investigate the cause on its own, which prompted it to conduct its first examination of the machinery on Dec. 3 with police consent.

The ministry has not reached any clear conclusion on the cause, either.

According to experts, elevators are designed so they never move up or down when the doors are open. But such abnormal movements have been reported in accidents.

On Dec. 8, a 50-year-old woman in Kyoto was trapped by an elevator descending as she was stepping out. Her pelvis was fractured.

According to the ministry, four such cases have been reported in the past five years, killing one person and injuring two others.

The ministry now plans to ask for police cooperation in cases of a serious accident so its experts can examine the elevator immediately to determine the cause.

Should technical flaws be found that might affect other elevators, the ministry would swiftly take preventive measures nationwide, sources said.

Last June, the National Police Agency issued a notice instructing prefectural police departments to cooperate with a ministry investigation as long as it does not hinder their own activities.(IHT/Asahi: January 10,2009)

2009年1月8日 星期四

Tent villagers in Tokyo

日本的貧富

Tent villagers live in a precarious situation

2009/1/6

The poignant strains of "Furusato" (Hometown) filled the wintry air, sung by a woman accompanied by an accordionist for the people at Toshikoshi Haken Mura (dispatch workers' New Year village), the temporary shelter set up in Tokyo's Hibiya Park to provide shelter and meals for jobless and homeless people over the year-end and New Year's holidays.

"After I reach my goal/ I will return home someday," the woman sang. Yet, before me stretched a long line, filled with people who have no homes to go to. They were all seeking food, shelter and warm clothing.

This landmark park in the heart of Tokyo was the perfect place to highlight the reality of the nation's desperate poverty today. The major media organizations are all concentrated nearby. The park is surrounded by institutions that stand for everything but poverty--bank headquarters, luxury hotels, the outer gardens of the Imperial Palace and government ministries and agencies.

The tent village could not have posed a greater contrast. The nearest government office is the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare--the entity responsible for the nation's health and employment issues.

Perhaps because they were determined not to let anyone freeze to death practically on their doorstep, officials opened the doors to an auditorium at the ministry to the "villagers."

It was a stroke of genius by the organizers to erect their tents there, shoving the problem of poverty right in the government's face.

But after Monday, this village will be dismantled and the auditorium doors shut. The hundreds of homeless people were asked to move to other temporary shelters. It is the government's responsibility to protect citizens in emergencies, but these people's constitutionally guaranteed "right to maintain the minimum standards of wholesome and cultured living" is precarious at best.

In his New Year's news conference, Prime Minister Taro Aso quoted a philosopher's words: "Pessimism comes from our passions; optimism from the will." He said this is one of his favorite quotes. Yet, the distress felt by people who have been fired can hardly be called a product of their passions. Aso, who is supposed to steer the nation through these critical times, seems to have a limited ability to read the prevailing public mood.

The same could be said of the crucial requirement that a leader must be able to persuade the nation to use its maximum powers of recovery.

If I may be so impertinent, I will also critique Aso's kakizome New Year's calligraphy which comprised the kanji characters for anshin (peace of mind) and katsuryoku (vitality). The final brush stroke was weak and blurry. He should have used more ink and stronger wrist control.

The year's political confrontations are about to begin, focusing on surviving this dismal economy. At the tent village, leaders of opposition parties vowed to end the current "political disaster."

During Aso's televised news conference, a tsunami warning flashed on the screen, prompting thoughts of what lies ahead in this turbulent new year.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Jan. 5(IHT/Asahi: January 6,2009)

2009年1月4日 星期日

24 top execs say economy to hit bottom after 2009

24 top execs say economy to hit bottom after 2009

Eighty percent of top corporate executives in the country predict the economy will hit bottom in 2010 or later, according to a Yomiuri Shimbun survey.

In the survey of the heads of 30 major companies, 24 said the economy, which has been slowing down, would hit its lowest point in 2010 or later.

Only five said it would happen by the end of this year.

Twenty-nine presidents predicted the 2009 real economic growth rate would be negative, with 12 saying the rate would be lower than minus 1 percent.

The government has forecast no growth for fiscal 2009 in real terms.

The Yomiuri survey showed, therefore, that the heads of the major companies were more pessimistic about the growth rate than the government.

Asked about the current state of the economy, 28 executives said it was clearly declining, while two said it was gradually declining. All of those surveyed agreed that the economy was in recession.

In last year's survey, none of the respondents gave such a view. The latest survey indicates that the financial crisis that started in the United States has rapidly undermined business confidence among Japanese managers.

The executives also were asked about how the economy could be put on track to recovery, and were allowed to give multiple answers.

Twenty-seven said the U.S. economy needed to recover, while 10 said growth in consumer spending and nine said implementation of further economic stimulus measures by the government were needed.

The executives also were asked to give multiple answers for the most important issues that should be tackled by the Cabinet of Prime Minister Taro Aso regarding the economy.

Stabilization of financial markets and further implementation of economic stimulus measures to increase public spending were each chosen by 14 executives.

Since summer, the government has come up with economic stimulus measures totaling 75 trillion yen, including distribution of a flat-sum cash benefit.

However, many corporate heads still believe that additional measures are needed.

Asked about Aso's proposal for increasing the consumption tax in fiscal 2011, five said they agreed with the idea, while nine said they understood the situation as inevitable, showing that nearly half of those surveyed either agreed with or accepted the tax hike plan.

The survey was conducted mostly through interviews in December.

(Jan. 4, 2009)

2009年1月3日 星期六

Kyoto Celebrates a 1,000-Year Love Affair

Footsteps

Kyoto Celebrates a 1,000-Year Love Affair

Ko Sasaki for The New York Times

The spirit of Murasaki Shikibu, author of “Tale of Genji,” abounds in Kyoto, as at a purification ceremony with period costumes at the Jonengu shrine.


Published: January 4, 2009

ON a glaring, color-drenched day in Kyoto, I walk unsteadily out of the traditional restaurant where I have spent the morning being costumed, painted and bewigged. Two chic dressers who turned a tatami room into a staging area for a literary fantasy mind the train flowing behind my heavy robes. Hiking up my red silk trouser skirts as I mince forward, I squint without my glasses — a modern touch that would betray the fact that I’m only pretending to be a noblewoman straight from “The Tale of Genji.”

The last year has been busier than most in Kyoto. This city, known for its shrines, temples and blazing autumn hills, is celebrating the millennial anniversary of Murasaki Shikibu’s episodic story of love and loss among the imperial set.

Considered by some to be the world’s first novel, “Genji” evokes particular pride in Japan’s ancient capital. The author’s ancestral home was on Teramachi Street, and she served as a lady-in-waiting at the imperial court. Even better, Lady Murasaki set much of the amorous action involving her decadent hero, the “Shining Prince,” in the mansions and palaces of Heian-kyo, as Kyoto once was called.

Across Japan, the anniversary has been marked by music festivals, parades, a chrysanthemum-doll competition and a hairstyle show featuring looks popular in Lady Murasaki’s time. In Kyoto, the festivities have included “Genji”-themed poetry readings, moon-viewings and even performance art, which I have chosen.

For two hours (and about $245), I indulge in the peculiar local custom of swanning about like a Disney character in traditional costume — in this case, the juni-hitoe, or “12 layers of robes,” fashionable in the Heian era. My outing in Arashiyama, a scenic district that encompasses bamboo groves and a park for macaques, includes a leisurely boat ride with friends on the Katsura River. As a boatman poles through the water, I pretend to be an aristocrat admiring “red leaves, beautiful in the autumn wind,” in the words of Lady Murasaki.

But that idyll is eclipsed by the opening of my “Tale of Genji Special Experience.” When my entourage and I step into a parking lot full of buses, an ant trail of tourists bound for the river halts and redirects itself. The sight of a foreigner with a pale-moon face, cherry-blossom lips and a raven wig prompts shouts of laughter. “Beautiful!” exclaims a tweedy man, stepping into my path with his camera.

Clearly, understanding a visionary whose work shaped Japan’s literary culture requires more than walking a few steps in her geta. Lady Murasaki’s own genius lay in exploring her subjects’ inner lives.

At a time when fiction — in the form of fables — was dismissed as brain-candy for females, she produced an epic whose psychological resonance was unprecedented. And she crafted her tales in Japanese, whose written form was still being developed. “Genji” was “a pyrotechnical display of literary creativity,” in the words of the anthropologist Liza Dalby, who imagined the writer’s life in “The Tale of Murasaki.”

A walk through downtown Kyoto in early November underscored the novel’s lasting power. Posters of the ingénue Yuki Shibamoto, the face of the national celebration, gazed from windows in office buildings and bridal shops. At the Museum of Kyoto, visitors inspected illustrated scrolls and painted screens from across the centuries depicting Genji’s exploits, and they walked out with playing cards and refrigerator magnets bearing images of Japan’s own Casanova. At the Starbuck’s on Sanjo, a schoolboy in a Harry Potter uniform paged through a manga inspired by Genji’s adventures.

These days, few digest the full epic, which runs more than 1,000 pages in English. In Japan, the home of the cellphone novel, the tale has morphed with the culture; inventors at Kyoto University have even produced a Murasaki robot that recites passages from her work. Eager to reach the masses, publishers offer racy mangas and abridged renditions in modern Japanese that can be “quite crude and even obscene,” says Donald Keene, a professor emeritus of Japanese literature at Columbia.

While “The Tale of Genji” spans three generations, the best-known sections focus on its title character, the son of the emperor and a lesser consort who dies when the boy is young. Genji has no chance of succeeding his father, but he’s still a lethal charmer. Lady Murasaki describes him at 17: “Over soft, layered white gowns he had only a dress cloak, unlaced at the neck. ... lying there in the lamplight, against a pillar, he looked so beautiful that one could have wished him a woman.”

To modern readers, the book’s enormous, emotive cast can seem overwrought: Addicted to “the rare amour fraught with difficulty and heartache,” the married hero impregnates his stepmother, falls in love with a child whom he raises to be his wife, and retreats into exile after he’s discovered in mid-tryst with the daughter of a political enemy. Supporting characters fall victim to amnesia and die of heartbreak; they exchange poems and dampen brocade sleeves with bitter tears.

Though a fragmented diary and her poetry survive, details about the author, whose stories captivated the Heian court, have faded. She belonged to a minor branch of the powerful Fujiwara clan, but her given name (like those of other women) was omitted from genealogies. Her nickname, Murasaki, is the name of one of Genji’s loves, and Shikibu comes from an office held by her father, a regional governor and Chinese scholar.

Look around, though, and her spirit materializes around Kyoto and beyond. Ishiyama-dera Temple, for example, is built atop a massive rock on Mount Garan, a half-hour train journey from the city. Begun in the middle of the eighth century, the temple complex, a shrine to the bodhisattva Kannon (the goddess of mercy), is known for its wild beauty; in a mossy forest punctuated by the neon maroons of Japanese maples and the brassy golds of gingkoes, the open-sided main hall, or hondo, feels like a whimsical treehouse.

But Ishiyama-dera is also, in a sense, a shrine to Lady Murasaki. According to tradition, “Genji” was conceived on a single night here in August 1004, as the author contemplated the moon.

On a steel-gray November day, the sacred hall there was suffused with the sedate buzz of the temple circuit in high season. Pleasant-looking women in eerily well-coordinated autumn colors padded about in their stocking feet, murmuring to one another. Older couples who blinked behind glasses too big for their faces trailed crisp-looking guides holding pennants.

A visitor stood apart: a solemn young woman whose floor-length mane fell over the blue-green mantle of a juni-hitoe. A companion followed her with a camera as she tugged a heavy rope to ring a sonorous bell and tossed coins into a wooden box. Gliding past a counter where others were choosing cellphone charms, the acolyte paused on the veranda before a pair of narrow rooms (with a moon view) where, as the story goes, the author had her epiphany.

In the front alcove, isolated as if on stage, a life-size Murasaki doll knelt behind a writing desk with her violet and green robes spilling around her; nearby was a screen used for privacy. Far behind her was a figure representing her daughter, Katako, staring past her mother’s shoulder with the look of an only child too proud to acknowledge that she’s lonely.

THE real Lady Murasaki was hardly a cloistered figure; at a time when mastering Chinese was considered unwomanly, she devoured the work of Chinese writers. Unlike the aristocratic women who became her readers, she cultivated a traveler’s perspective; before she married a wealthy courtier, she almost certainly accompanied her widowed father to a posting in Echizen.

The author also was able to eavesdrop on life at court. Her husband’s observations may have helped fuel her vivid stories, according to Ms. Dalby. In 1006, the regent Fujiwara Michinaga invited Lady Murasaki (by then widowed) to become Empress Shoshi’s companion and tutor — apparently because early sections of “Genji,” which is believed to have been completed around 1008, had found a delighted audience in her household.

In her diary, Lady Murasaki reveals that her privileged neighbors were given to jealousy, drunkenness and ennui. She felt estranged from vapid figures, including a lady-in-waiting who spread “malicious, unfounded rumors” about her.

“I cannot be bothered to discuss matters in front of those women who continually carp and are so full of themselves: it would only cause trouble,” she writes. “So all they see of me is a facade. There are times when I am forced to sit with them, and on such occasions I simply ignore their petty criticisms, not because I am particularly shy but because I consider it pointless. As a result, they now look upon me as a dullard.”

The woman who held her tongue, of course, had the last word: conjuring precise elements that brilliantly reflected the refined ambience at court.

Another pilgrimage popular with Murasaki fans is to Uji (about 20 minutes by train from Kyoto) where the Tale of Genji Museum channels the sensuality of Lady Murasaki’s work. A rugged but romantic retreat for Heian-era aristocrats, Uji is set in hilly and fertile terrain; Japan’s most highly prized green tea is grown there, and local delicacies include tofu scented with matcha.

On the ancient bridge across the Uji River, weekend visitors savoring soft-serve green-tea ice cream leaned against the railings to watch cormorants wading in the shallows. Nearby, at a monument to Lady Murasaki, “Genji” fans shot photos of one another with her statue to post on Flickr.

Uji’s centerpiece is its museum, an artfully landscaped glass structure that evokes Genji’s world with ceremonial costumes and an ox-drawn carriage and a scale-model version of his mansion. A display of exotica used to concoct incense was a reminder that the “Shining Prince” could be identified by his alluring scent alone.

Fragrant coils of incense were burning in the tiny gift shop, which sells hard candies bearing Genji’s likeness. Next door, there was a happy ruckus in the “Get to Know Genji Corner,” where well-dressed visitors crowded around computers where they could insert photos of their faces onto images of Lady Murasaki’s characters. Men resembled upholstered Sumo wrestlers in the Genji look, which involves chunky robes and what appears to be a pillbox hat topped with a jaunty handle.

The atmosphere was more serene — and the author’s spirit, closer — at the site of her ancestral home in Kyoto. Just east of the Imperial Palace Park, it is now the site of Rozan-ji Temple, a brooding, tile-roofed structure in a leafy neighborhood where ladies in jogging suits share sidewalks with grownups furiously pedaling low-tech bikes.

In the 10th century, the property belonged to Lady Murasaki’s father, a poet; tradition has it that at least part of Genji was written there. In a city where disastrous fires were endemic, the mansion eventually gave way to a temple that itself was rebuilt over the centuries. Only one tile from the home remains, but the place has a stillness that would suit the lonely work of writing.

When I visited Rozan-ji on a drizzly afternoon, the property was flooded by a tour group. While they gazed at the black and gold altar room, I slid along the ancient, satiny floor in my socks. An enormous obsidian crow from the throng in the park shrieked comically and landed on the garden wall.

Following the cry, I sat on the porch by the Zen garden, a space called Genji-niwa. Unlike other places touched by Lady Murasaki’s legacy, it seems timeless: white gravel defines the simple curves of moss islands punctuated by the occasional tree or rock. Stare at the design for long minutes, and it turns into a puzzle — one that I decided will look the same in a thousand years.

A 2D MILLENNIUM

Though the Genji millennial celebration is over, visitors can commune with the spirit of Murasaki Shikibu at these sites in and near Kyoto.

Ishiyama-dera Temple (1-1-1 Ishiyama-dera, Otsu-shi; 81-77-537-0013; www.ishiyamadera.or.jp, in Japanese only) is open 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Admission is 500 yen (about $5.40 at 93 yen to the dollar.

Rozan-ji Temple (397 Kitanobe-cho 1-chome, Teramachi-dori Hirokoji-agaru, Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto; 81-75-231-0355; www.pref.kyoto.jp/visitkyoto/en/theme/sites/shrines/temples/m_rozan) is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. General admission, 400 yen.

Tale of Genji Museum (45-26 Uji Higashiuchi, Uji-shi; 81-774-39-9300; www.uji-genji.jp) is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., except on Monday. General admission, 500 yen.