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September 07, 2025
 

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DEPOPULATION

People buy groceries from a mobile supermarket in a rural area of Nagomi, Kumamoto Prefecture. The government is considering a new "hometown resident" registration system to help strengthen regional revitalization measures.
JAPAN
Sep 7, 2025
Japan eyes two types of 'hometown resident' registration
The system is included in the government's basic vision for regional revitalization, adopted in June.
Redevelopment plans for Kawayu Onsen have hit some snags — an example of how bringing tourists back to declining rural communities is far from easy work.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Sep 6, 2025
In rural Hokkaido, the stops and starts of tourism revival on full display
A new luxury resort might halt the decline of Kawayu, but only if locals and businesses can agree on how to move forward.
Hiroshi Okada of the Financial Services Agency
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 3, 2025
FSA urges rural banks to help companies get equity funding
The FSA is working to draw up a package of policy measures to expand regional banks’ roles in supporting economies hit by adverse demographic shifts.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (center) speaks at a meeting of the government's Headquarters for Creating New Regional Economies and Living Environments on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Sep 2, 2025
System launched to support regional cooperation across prefectures
The central government plans to provide grants and subsidies to help local governments and businesses with regional development initiatives, and will relax regulations on request.
Iraqi refugee Humam al-Gburi, 34, and retired nurse Ursula Panke, 85, in Altena, Germany, on July 15. Since Humam's arrival in 2015, he has been supported by Ursula, who volunteers as his mentor.
WORLD / Society
Sep 2, 2025
German town that welcomed migrants finds adding people won't fix fundamentals
Political failure to tackle rising inflation, job losses in the auto industry and a sense of economic decline now makes migrants a target for the anti-immigrant AfD.
The annual number of babies in Japan has been on a downward trend since around 1975, falling below 1 million in 2016, 900,000 in 2019 and 800,000 in 2022.
JAPAN / Society
Aug 29, 2025
Japan births hit fresh low in first half of 2025
The January-June figure, including babies born to foreign nationals living in Japan and Japanese nationals living overseas, stood below 400,000 for the fourth consecutive year.
Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda (second from left) walks with Fed Chair Jerome Powell (left), European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde (second from right) and Bank of England Gov. Andrew Bailey outside the Fed’s Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium on Friday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 24, 2025
BOJ's Ueda expects tight labor market to keep upward pressure on wages
The remarks are likely to support growing speculation of another interest rate hike this year, although the BOJ governor didn’t directly discuss monetary policy in a presentation.
The area around Shibuya Station in Tokyo. After the end of World War II, population concentration in the capital accelerated while other parts of Japan continue to see population declines.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Aug 18, 2025
80 years on: Tokyo prospers while local revitalization still insufficient
Experts stress the importance of setting up a system in which industrial resources are circulated locally in order to create a sustainable society.
A street in Tokyo's Shinjuku district on Wednesday
JAPAN / Society
Aug 7, 2025
Biggest drop in Japanese nationals seen alongside record high in foreign residents
The number of Japanese nationals on Jan. 1 was 120.7 million, while the number of foreign residents had risen 10.65% in a year to 3.68 million.
Oita Prefectural Kusu Miyama High School in the town of Kusu, Oita Prefecture
JAPAN / Regional Voices: Kyushu
Aug 4, 2025
Two Oita towns to launch program to nurture aspiring local teachers
As the towns are facing population decline, there are few young aspiring teachers there.
Justice Minister Keisuke Suzuki attends a news conference at the Japan National Press Club in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Society
Jul 31, 2025
Japan's foreign population could top 10% in 2040, says justice minister
A 2023 estimate had projected that Japan's foreign population would exceed 10% in the 2070s.
An image of the simulation technology developed by Fujitsu
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 24, 2025
Fujitsu and Nagoya University develop AI-based tech to spread ride-hailing
The new technology will be offered to local governments struggling to secure means of transportation for elderly residents and business operators facing a shortage of drivers.
Miyazaki Gov. Shunji Kono speaks at a meeting of the National Governors' Association in the city of Aomori on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 24, 2025
Governors urge central government to address Japan's shrinking population
During a two-day meeting in Aomori Prefecture, governors called for the establishment of a government agency-level control tower to coordinate related policies.
Representatives of four major nonlife insurance companies receive a notice from the Japan Fair Trade Commission regarding a cease and desist order, on Oct. 31, 2024, in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward.
BUSINESS / Companies / FOCUS
Jul 22, 2025
Scandals put Japanese nonlife insurers' business model at a crossroads
A series of recent scandals has brought to light deeply entrenched and problematic business practices within the industry.
Yukio Iokibe’s “Noto Democracy" centers on Motoyuki Takii, a former junior high school teacher who publishes a handwritten newspaper every month to encourage the residents of Anamizu, Ishikawa Prefecture, to engage in local politics.
CULTURE / Film
Jul 20, 2025
‘Noto Democracy’ and the slow work of civic change
As rural towns in Japan decline, Yukio Iokibe’s documentary offers a hopeful reminder that democracy endures through advocacy, persistence and human connection.
A woman holding a child listens to a stump speech in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward on June 25.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 18, 2025
Parties vow measures to tackle falling birth rate
Last year, Japan recorded fewer than 700,000 births for the first time.
Mod's memoir “Things Become Other Things” chronicles his walking trips across the Kii Peninsula, surveying “a graceful end to a certain life cycle.”
CULTURE / Books
Jul 16, 2025
Craig Mod's life in motion in a disappearing Japan
In “Things Become Other Things,” the longtime resident of Japan captures that grace that lingers in slowly vanishing countryside towns.
A municipal library in Fujikawa, Yamanashi Prefecture, that opened in July 2023, has become a community hub.
JAPAN
Jul 16, 2025
Work to consolidate public facilities gains traction across Japan
Municipal facilities such as libraries are increasingly being constructed within government office complexes in a bid to streamline public services.
The new administrative body would serve as a cross-agency "control tower" to respond to issues such as crime and overtourism involving foreign nationals, according to the government.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 15, 2025
Japan launches government body to address concerns over foreign nationals
The body will serve as a cross-agency "control tower" to respond to issues such as crime and overtourism involving foreign nationals, the government said.
Shuhei Nakata, president of Nakata Kogei — a wooden-hanger maker in Toyooka, Hyogo Prefecture — says a revised work evaluation system and a strict policy against workplace harassment has helped to attract women to the company.
JAPAN / Regional Voices: Fukushima
Jul 14, 2025
Fukushima looks to local initiatives to combat population decline
The measures will bring the area in line with other parts of Japan that are proactively trying to retain residents.
‘Confugenics’ and East Asia's demographic crisis
East Asia’s fertility plunge is driven not just by financial costs but by perfectionist cultural expectations that burden parents with intense educational and social demands.
Japan prince comes of age as succession crisis looms
Prince Hisahito concludes his elaborate "kakan no gi" coming-of-age ceremony at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo on Saturday.
Bangladesh is a South Asian time bomb
Many Bangladeshis hoped that the overthrow of long-time leader Sheikh Hasina last year would revitalize the country’s democracy after an authoritarian lurch under the “iron lady.” Instead it has led to proliferating human-rights abuses, intensifying repression and widespread Islamist violence.
Japan to experience blood moon lunar eclipse on Monday
A blood moon is seen during a partial eclipse in the sky over Lake George near Canberra on March 14.
Japan's $550 billion investment pledge outlined in MOU
U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Ryosei Akazawa, Japan’s chief tariff negotiator, sign trade agreements on Thursday in Washington.
In rural Hokkaido, the stops and starts of tourism revival on full display
Redevelopment plans for Kawayu Onsen have hit some snags — an example of how bringing tourists back to declining rural communities is far from easy work.
London’s calling and sumo’s top division — along with Hello Kitty — are ready to answer
Yokozuna Hoshoryu and Hello Kitty, an ambassador for sumo's upcoming tour to London, at Tokyo's Kokugikan on Tuesday
Resonac creates 27-member consortium to pursue advanced chip developments
Representatives from member companies of JOINT3, a consortium working together on semiconductor-related developments announced by Resonac, pose for a photo in Tokyo on Wednesday.
Haru Nemuri’s radical new album refuses easy listening
Musician Haruna Kimishima, better known as Haru Nemuri, confronts Japan’s politics, nationalism and censorship on her recent output.
Overseas sluggers step up to bat in small-town Hokkaido
The Betsukai Pilot Spirits welcomed new players (left to right) Yuta Yamanaka, Roman Guthrie, Scott Bellina and Leo Jiminian this year, pictured here with Yassir Lachkar of the Ishikari Red Phoenix.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past
By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.
We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.

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