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February 01, 2025

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EDITORIALS

Feb 22, 2010

New chairman of business lobby

The Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren) has picked Mr. Hiromasa Yonekura, chairman of Sumitomo Chemical Co., as its next leader. He will begin serving as chairman of Japan's most powerful business lobby in late May. His appointment comes at a difficult time as the Japanese economy is suffering...

EDITORIALS

Feb 22, 2010

Call for debate on smoking

Recently Japan Tobacco Inc. (JT) and the state were successful in their defense against a damages suit in which three people had sought ¥10 million each for health problems — cancer and pulmonary emphysema — allegedly caused by smoking. Still, the Jan. 20 Yokohama District Court ruling, which the...

EDITORIALS

Feb 21, 2010

Financial squeeze for students

The most recent evidence of the terrible effects of Japan's economic slowdown comes from the National Federation of University Co-operative Associations. This consumer cooperative, which researches and supports university life, reported last October that more university students than ever are having...

EDITORIALS

Feb 21, 2010

The last newspaper train

Japan's last "newspaper train" will make its final run in March, ending a long history of Japanese trains serving readers as well as passengers. The JR Sobu Line has carried evening papers from Ryogoku Station to areas in the Boso Peninsula in Chiba Prefecture for many years. The March 12 train, however,...

EDITORIALS

Feb 20, 2010

The battle to save the euro

The European Union is facing one of the worst economic crises of its life. The immediate trigger is Greece, which has been living well beyond its means. As the prospect of a default looms, the Athens government has pledged to embrace austerity measures, but public resistance is high. The Greek government...

EDITORIALS

Feb 19, 2010

Give hospital doctors a raise

In a report for fiscal 2010 submitted Feb. 12 to health minister Akira Nagatsuma, the Central Social Insurance Medical Council (Chuikyo) calls for greater remuneration for hospitals. This would be a step forward in the government's effort to stem the stream of resignations by hospital doctors and thus...

EDITORIALS

Feb 19, 2010

Debates miss big picture

Liberal Democratic Party leader Sadakazu Tanigaki and Komeito leader Natsuo Yamaguchi had separate one-on-one debates with Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama in the Diet Wednesday, although the debates were a long time coming. Five months have already passed since the Hatoyama administration began. Such debates...

EDITORIALS

Feb 18, 2010

Justice finally served

The Yokohama District Court on Feb. 4 ruled that five now-deceased men, three of them journalists, were falsely charged in a case known as the Yokohama Incident, which is regarded as the worst example of wartime free-speech suppression, and ordered the government to pay compensation to six relatives...

EDITORIALS

Feb 17, 2010

Space program: Hopes and fears

A Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying Japanese Astronaut Soichi Noguchi was launched Dec. 21. He is now in the International Space Station some 400 km above Earth working in Japan's space lab "Kibo" (Hope), which is attached to the ISS. He will stay in space for five months, the longest stretch yet for...

EDITORIALS

Feb 17, 2010

Jobs, wages still a concern

Japan's gross domestic product (GDP) in the October-December quarter increased 1.1 percent in real terms or an annualized 4.6 percent from the previous quarter, marking expansion for three consecutive quarters. GDP for all of 2009 fell 5 percent in real terms from 2008 — the worst contraction since...

EDITORIALS

Feb 16, 2010

Green pledges put on the record

Making good on a Jan. 31 deadline under the Copenhagen Accord, 55 countries submitted their commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to the secretariat of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC).

EDITORIALS

Feb 15, 2010

Golden 20 for McDonald's Russia

Twenty years ago, McDonald's opened its first store in Russia. The appearance of the Golden Arches in Moscow's Pushkin Square predated the collapse of the Soviet Union, but it should have been seen as a harbinger of the end of the autarkic Soviet economic model. The company marked the landmark event...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Ayumi Matsuki, a priestess at Yoshiwara Shrine, shows off some "o-mamori" charms. She says visitors to the shrine have increased since the NHK drama “Unbound” began airing this month.

Tracing Tsutaya Juzaburo, Edo’s media maverick

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

mission sustainability vol.14 : Unicharm Corp.Unicharm recycles diapers back into diapers

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