◎俞智敏
A Tokyo district plagued with burglaries has turned to planting flowers to beautify its streets and help stamp out crime.
東京一飽受竊案所苦的地區，透過種花美化街道來協助消除犯罪。
"’Operation Flower’ began about three years ago. By planting flowers facing the street, more people will be keeping an eye out while taking care of the flowers or watering them," said Kiyotaka Ohyagi, a Suginami City official. "The best way to prevent crime is to have more people on the lookout."
據杉並區官員大八木清高表示，「『種花行動』約在3年前展開。透過在街道旁種花，有更多人會在照顧花或澆花時留意周遭環境。」「防止犯罪最好的辦法就是讓更多人保持警戒。」
Suginami, with a population of 528,800, saw a record 1,710 break-ins in 2002.
杉並區人口約有52萬8800人，2002年卻創下1710起闖空門案的犯罪新高紀錄。
When a neighbourhood watch group found that there were fewer burglaries in buildings on flower-lined streets, Suginami decided to kick off Operation Flower and asked volunteers to plant seeds on side streets and in front of their homes.
當一個鄰里守望互助組織發現，在種滿鮮花街道兩邊的大樓竊案發生率較低時，杉並區決定發起「種花行動」，並呼籲志工在小巷裡和自家門前也種下花苗。
The flowers are part of a wider crime prevention campaign. The district also has 9,600 volunteer patrollers and 200 security cameras set up in areas where there are frequent break-ins. It also emails crime information daily to residents.
種花只是預防犯罪廣泛行動的其中一環。杉並區還有9600位巡守員，並在竊盜率最高的區域安裝了200具保全攝影機。區公所還會每天寄發犯罪情報電子郵件給居民。
Suginami says its efforts have paid off, with the number of burglaries falling to 390 in 2008, down almost 80 percent from 2002.
杉並區表示這些努力已經奏效，去年該區的竊案數量已降至390起，比2002年減少了近八成。
新聞辭典
flower power：花兒力量，指一九六○、七○年代美國嬉皮運動人士所主張一種以愛與和平改革社會的非暴力信仰。
on the lookout：片語，指保持警戒狀態，或指尋找某人或某事，如Be on the lookout for signs of a storm.（留心暴風雨即將到來的徵兆），或I’m always on the lookout for interesting new recipes.（我一直在尋找有趣的新食譜。）
pay off：動詞片語，指成功、奏效，如All her hard work paid off in the end, and she finally passed the exam.（她先前的努力果然有效，她終於通過了考試。）
Price-cutting in Japan points to repeat of deflation misery
Japan, which showed the world how awful a sustained bout of deflation can be, may be heading back into that vortex.
The country’s main index of consumer prices dropped 1.1% in May from a year earlier, the biggest decline since 2002, the government said Friday.
Oil is part of the explanation here: Because crude prices have fallen so far from their peaks a year ago, they’re exerting unusual downward pressure on inflation rates. In the U.S. the consumer price index, including food and energy costs, was down 1.3% in May from a year earlier, the biggest drop since 1950.
But excluding food and energy the U.S. CPI was up 1.8% in May from a year earlier. In Japan, by contrast, the CPI ex-food and energy was down 0.5% in the same period, signaling more widespread price cutting.
Japan is much more sensitive to the risk of true deflation, which is a broad-based decline in prices that can feed on itself and have a severe debilitating effect on an economy.
From Bloomberg in Tokyo:
"Profits fall, then wages come down, then consumers stop shopping," said Junko Nishioka, chief Japan economist at RBS Securities Japan Ltd. in Tokyo. "And because people aren’t shopping, companies lower prices. That’s the process that we’re starting to see. It isn’t easy to break out of."
Consumers, whose spending accounts for more than half of the economy, may delay purchases if they expect goods to get cheaper. That would erode profits and force companies to cut wages, which have already slid for 11 months.
Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano said an "extreme" slump in demand and production are causing the drop. "We continue to monitor developments in prices and need to carefully manage the economy to avoid a deflationary spiral," he said.
As Japan struggled in the aftermath of its real estate and banking system crashes of the early 1990s, the economy stagnated in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
That brought on deflation: Japan’s consumer price index fell every year from 1998 to 2002, was unchanged in 2003, then declined again in 2004. The index began to move modestly higher in 2005.
The policy responses of the Obama administration and Federal Reserve to last year’s economic and credit catastrophes have in large part been aimed at keeping the U.S. from falling into a similar deflationary cycle.
The Fed wants to believe it’s winning the battle, as I noted in this post on Wednesday. But many economists say the risk of sustained Japan-style deflation in the U.S. remains high.
-- Tom Petruno
Photo: Shopping in Tokyo. Credit: Toshiyuki Aizawa / Bloomberg News
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