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JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Communities are offered cash to reduce pollution

The Environment Ministry plans to tackle global warming by paying community groups for their reductions in carbon dioxide emissions, ministry officials said Friday.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Record 7 million lost their jobs in 2001

About 7.01 million workers lost their jobs in 2001, marking the largest exodus ever, according to an annual report on employment released recently by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, which started compiling relevant figures in 1991.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Japan Telecom to sell off part of engineering unit

Japan Telecom Holdings Co. said Friday it has agreed to sell off part of an engineering subsidiary to Australian-based construction and real estate company Bovis Lend Lease Corp. in an effort to concentrate on its core telecommunications business.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Former Foreign Minister Tanaka tenders Diet resignation

In a surprise move, former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka on Friday tendered her resignation to the House of Representatives in an apparent move to take responsibility for allegations that she misappropriated her secretaries' salaries.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Nakano to vie for leadership of DPJ

Kansei Nakano, a top-ranking member of the Democratic Party of Japan, officially announced Friday that he will run for head of the main opposition party next month, the eighth person to join the race.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Crime hits record high on Japan's mean streets

The number of criminal cases in the first half of this year hit a record 1,351,727, up 4.9 percent from a year earlier, the National Police Agency said Thursday.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Cops search USJ; exec admits error

OSAKA -- Osaka police searched two Universal Studios Japan offices Friday in connection with the unauthorized use and storage of explosives at the Hollywood theme park.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Nippon Ham rating may be slashed

Moody's Investors Service Inc. said Friday it has placed Nippon Meat Packers Inc.'s A3 senior unsecured long-term debt rating under review for possible downgrade, following the mislabeling scandal at the meat processor's subsidiary, Nippon Food Inc.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Foreigners end six-month buying spree

Nonresident investors turned net sellers on the Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya bourses in July for the first time in six months, with a record number of stocks sold.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Bridgestone recovers from tire-recall debacle

Bridgestone Corp. said Friday it posted a consolidated net profit of 24.48 billion yen in the January-June period, marking a turnaround from the 30.57 billion yen loss it logged a year earlier.
Japan Times
JAPAN / MUSEUM MUSINGS
Aug 10, 2002

Reformer Eiichi Shibusawa's ideals point way forward

With the country's economic problems continuing, and with people apparently at a loss over how to remedy the situation, Shibusawa Memorial Museum offers a hint to the path Japan should take by showcasing the starting point of its earlier era of modernization.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Nippon Food Inc. Osaka unit raided

OSAKA -- Farm ministry officials on Friday searched Nippon Food Inc.'s Osaka unit, which was implicated in the defrauding of a state-run beef buyback program, ministry officials said.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Sapporo Breweries sees red

Sapporo Breweries Ltd. said Friday its group operating balance sank into the red in the January-June first half due to lower sales, higher expenses and tougher competition. The brewery's consolidated operating loss for the period came to 1.27 billion yen, a turnaround from a profit of 2.69 billion yen...
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Small, midsize firms to get better chance at state bailout

The land ministry plans to make applications of the industrial revitalization law easier for small and midsize construction companies, which are struggling due to cuts in public works spending, ministry officials said.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Business confidence surges as exports, production rise

Business confidence showed a dramatic quarter-on-quarter improvement in the April-June period due to a pickup in exports and production, according to a government report released Friday.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

BOJ to keep monetary policy as is

Amid a worldwide slump in share prices, the Bank of Japan announced Friday it will keep its monetary policy unchanged, maintaining its wait-and-see attitude as it continues to pump excess funds into money markets.
COMMENTARY
Aug 10, 2002

The danger of good intentions

HONOLULU -- After a year and a half of gradual improvement, relations between the United States and China appear to be taking a turn for the worse. Two recent U.S. reports sharply criticize U.S. policy toward China and have earned equally sharp criticism from Beijing in return. While we shouldn't overestimate...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 10, 2002

All about God, the gold sweat shirt guy

When I was a child, I believed God was a bald guy in a gold cotton sweat shirt with the letter "G," for God, on it. I still believe this. Only now, his sweat shirt is 50 percent polyester and 50 percent cotton, preshrunk. The gold color has faded and the "G" is wearing off , peeling in little specks...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Aug 10, 2002

Wayne Hunter

Regular visitors to the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan at Yurakucho, Tokyo, are familiar with the tall young New Zealander there who speaks impressively fluent Japanese. Wayne Hunter joined the club's staff three years ago, and moved through several positions to become media liaison manager. He...
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Man with 70 million yen stabbed; cash untouched

A man who almost daily withdrew cash from a bank for a pachinko parlor was beaten and stabbed by four men Friday morning after he took out almost 70 million yen, but his assailants fled without the cash, police said.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

Mizuho interest rates at record low

Mizuho Corporate Bank, one of the two main arms of Mizuho Holdings Inc., said Friday it will reduce its interest rate on ordinary deposits to a record low 0.001 percent per year from the current 0.02 percent, effective Monday.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 10, 2002

For country, for Coca-Cola, for cool companies

Jud Taylor is not only George Taylor, but George P. Taylor IX. His father was a psychologist, his grandfather a doctor and (according to family lore) the generations stretch back to a blacksmith who signed the American Declaration of Independence, for Pennsylvania, in 1776.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Record numbers avoiding school

A record 138,696 elementary and junior high school students were absent from school for at least 30 days without good reason during the school year that ended in March, according to the results of an education ministry survey released Friday.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2002

S&P assigns CGS score to Orix

Standard & Poor's Corp. said Friday it has assigned a corporate governance score of CGS-7.8 to financial services firm Orix Corp. According to S&P, companies that achieve scores in the CGS-7 and CGS-8 ranges have strong overall corporate governance processes and practices. The maximum possible score...
EDITORIALS
Aug 9, 2002

A setback in fiscal reform

Earlier in his administration, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi projected an image of aggressive leadership as he called for "no pain, no gain" structural reform. His bold plans included streamlining the bloated government budget. With the economy still struggling to recover, however, he seems to have...

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