On the eve of Disaster Prevention Day in Japan, communications experts urged authorities using social media to improve messaging targeting foreign residents of Japan and visitors to the country so that what they are trying to convey will come through loud and clear.
Amid an increase in the number of non-Japanese in the country, the government is pushing forward with translation and interpretation services, with many organizations including media outlets launching platforms with simplified Japanese.
But Isao Iori, a professor at the Center for Global Education at Tokyo's Hitotsubashi University, believes that the simple translation of terminology and phrases is not enough to help foreign nationals take action in an emergency, as the advisory lacks information on what to do and when.
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