Typhoon in Okinawa and Amami & more –1st Aug 2023

Konnichiwa from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Japan Update from the 1st of August twenty twenty-three A quick summary of what's going down in Japan.

The Meteorological Agency warned that a severe typhoon will hit Okinawa and the Amami Islands, which are southwest of the island of Kyushu, on the evening of Tuesday the 1st. They predicted the typhoon will get worse on Wednesday the 2nd, with winds becoming strong enough to destroy houses. Officials warned of violent winds, and storm surges, which will increase the risk of landslides and flooding. They recommended that residents, especially those in low-lying areas, protect their lives in the face of severe weather and pay attention to local evacuation notices. Since the typhoon might slow down as it passes Okinawa, officials say that heavy rain and wind might still be around even after Thursday the 3rd.

Although the typhoon isn’t expected to touch the rest of Japan, non-Okinawan residents aren’t getting off scot-free. Japan is currently suffering through a heatwave reaching dangerous temperatures. It worsened over the weekend, with weather officials sending out heatstroke alerts for most of the country. On Saturday the 29th, in Kumagata City, it reached thirty-nine degrees Celsius, or 102 degrees Fahrenheit. In Kyoto, Saitama, and Fukushima, it hit thirty-eight degrees Celsius, or 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Hospitals have seen an increase in heatstroke patients, and sadly some of them died. The Meteorological Agency said that the heatwave will continue until Friday the 4th. The Environment Ministry encourages everyone to stay hydrated, use air conditioning, and avoid outdoor activity unless absolutely necessary.

In politics, the United States announced its plans on Friday the 28th to host a three-way summit with Japan and South Korea. The summit will take place on the 18th of August at the Camp David presidential retreat near Washington. The United States hopes to discuss global security issues, particularly how to deal with North Korea’s continued missile launches and nuclear development program.

Another international meeting is taking place over the course of this week and next, this one for the UN’s treaty to move toward nuclear disarmament.

The treaty appoints a Preparatory Committee with representatives from each country to hold a meeting every few years to talk about ways to stop creating nuclear weapons. During this year’s committee meeting in Vienna, Austria, Japan’s and China’s representatives butted heads over Japan’s plans to release treated water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the ocean. China's representative opposed the plan, referring to the water as "contaminated," while Japan's representative said that the International Atomic Energy Agency approved the plan since it met international safety standards. Japan’s representative also pointed out that it’s dangerous to raise doubts without scientific proof. The Japanese government intends to start releasing the treated water this summer once it has been diluted to meet the World Health Organization’s guidelines for drinking water.

In other news, the Japanese government is thinking of raising the country's average minimum wage to a thousand yen or seven US dollars per hour. The government put together a panel with representatives from labor unions and corporate management, which held its fourth meeting on Wednesday the 26th to talk about the average minimum wage.. The current minimum wage of 961 yen, or six dollars and eighty cents per hour, means that full-time workers can only earn 14,200 US dollars per year, which is low by global standards. The labor unions are arguing for an even bigger increase than seven US dollars per hour, but the corporate side says they’re worried about the impact on small- and medium-sized businesses. The corporate words were called into question, as this might be an excuse not to raise their employees’ wages. For the time being, the panel plans to increase the minimum wage to seven US dollars per hour but hasn’t said when they were going to implement the new initiative.

The increase in wages is long overdue, especially as the cost of living keeps going up. But further changes may be needed, as the labor ministry found that many older people are applying for jobs. The ministry said that senior citizens are having trouble making ends meet on their pensions, and as such, are rejoining the workforce.

Legislating is shifting in other industries, as well. After the scandal from the talent agency Johnny & Associates, where former members said the late founder sexually abused minors, the government implemented new measures to help prevent future abuse on Wednesday the 26th. The measures include a hotline specifically for male victims of sexual abuse, consultation services for those who have been harassed, and stronger punishments for managers and teachers who abuse those in their care. Legislators also hope to make it so that people will have to prove they have no record of sex crimes before working with children, such as in schools or daycares. They plan to model it after similar laws in the UK.

If Johnny & Associates’ sex scandals weren’t enough to make you wonder what’s wrong with people nowadays, this next story might.

On Wednesday the 26th, a twenty-nine-year-old man broke into an Osaka junior high school with a knife. A teacher managed to subdue him and then called the police, who arrested the suspect. The school was closed for summer vacation, but there were still some students present doing club activities, but fortunately, no one was injured, and staff had the students evacuate as soon as they spotted the intruder.

Meanwhile, a lot has been going on in the business world.

BMW Japan, a subsidiary of the German car manufacturer BMW, is recalling nearly 170,000 vehicles in Japan due to an engine defect that could cause a fire. The recall includes twenty-seven models made between June twenty twelve and December twenty twenty-two. The issue causes soot to gather in the intake pipe, which in the worst-case scenario, could cause a fire. Thirty-eight people reported car troubles related to the engine defect, including four fires, but thankfully, no one has been injured. BMW says they’ll replace the defective parts at its dealerships for free.

BMW isn’t the only company facing internal issues.

A popular department store chain, Isetan Mitsukoshi, just paid 700 million yen, or five million US dollars, in back taxes. According to Japanese law, stores can sell duty-free items to foreign tourists, so long as they don't plan to resell them inside Japan. These items come without the standard ten percent consumption tax, so it's a good way to attract foreign travelers. However, in order to sell things duty-free, store clerks have to check the buyer's passport and tell them they can't sell the item in Japan. The chain store had a bad habit of not checking ID and sold to foreigners who weren't eligible for duty-free items. In total, tax officials found they'd skimped on nearly five million US dollars worth of consumption tax over the course of three years up until March twenty twenty-two. A tax expert said Japan may need to reconsider how the duty-free laws are implemented so that they aren't so easily abused.

And to close this edition, the government is thinking forward to the World Expo in twenty twenty-five, which will take place in Osaka. During the World Expo, many different countries will hold exhibitions centering around current global issues and how to solve them. Each country will need to build its own pavilion for its exhibition, but in order to do that, they first need to submit a plan for the pavilion. Of the 153 countries that said they’ll participate in the expo, only one has submitted a basic plan for their pavilion. Since all of the pavilions have to be built by the 13th of July,twenty twenty-four, and the plans need to be submitted before the building can start, it’s a pretty tight deadline. Officials worry that short-notice plans combined with rising costs of construction materials and Japan’s labor shortage will delay preparations. To help things along, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry plans to set up an insurance scheme to help Japanese construction companies build pavilions for foreign participants.

Aaaaand that’s it for this week! Thanks for joining us!

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Mata Ne!