Over 50% of municipalities holding matchmaking events, marriage seminars to help singles: survey
More than 50 percent of local governments in Japan are supporting single men and women through matchmaking and marriage seminars to help them get married, a recent Kyodo News survey showed, highlighting public efforts to curb the nation's dwindling birthrate and depopulation. The survey released ...
Population wilted to 24, Japan's former 'island of flowers' hopes newcomers plant roots
Residents on a tiny island in the Seto Inland Sea are trying to woo new settlers to revive the community and save their hometown from being deserted. The people of Shishi Island in Kagawa Prefecture have launched initiatives to promote tourism and encourage settlement, aiming ...
Graying Japan wants automation, not immigration
A labor shortage could fuel the nation's next innovation boom.
Japan's richest village having hard time luring low-pay workers to process its pricey scallops
Sarufutsu in the far north of Hokkaido is the nation's richest village, thanks to a bounty of scallops pulled from the Sea of Okhotsk. The village — which is closer to the Russian island of Sakhalin than Tokyo — boasts some of the highest average ...
Regional banks pursuing mergers to ensure their survival should also scrutinize their operations to find areas where they can improve their performances.
Japan's shrinking rural population poses a dilemma for democracy
Deep in the Shikoku wilderness, along a steep winding road above a dark green river, sits the tiny village of Okawa. It's located in a region sometimes dubbed by enthusiastic travel writers as the "Tibet of Japan" for its comparative isolation within the mountains. With ...
Japan Inc. might finally have to fatten paychecks
After years of resisting wage hikes, Japanese companies are starting to recognize the need to lock in staff before they literally disappear.
The government needs to take measures to deal more effectively with land plots that remain unregistered.
Toyama embarks on compact redesign to foil natural disasters, depopulation at same time
Since early July, floods and landslides caused by heavy rain have forced tens of thousands of people from Kyushu to Tohoku to evacuate, with nearly three dozen deaths confirmed in western Japan. The financial damage to Oita Prefecture alone now stands at over ¥20 ...
Most Japanese firms see positives in raising retirement age amid tight labor market: poll
More than half of Japanese companies are planning to raise the retirement age of their workforce, a Reuters poll shows, with many saying it would alleviate the labor shortage and harness the expertise of veteran workers. In the country, most companies require full-time employees to ...
Younger Japanese urbanites increasingly being drawn to quiet rural life
In a move more commonly associated with seniors seeking a quiet place to retire, an increasing number of young couples are showing interest in relocating to the countryside from Tokyo and other urban centers, drawn by cheap land and hopes of a better environment ...
Japan's regional universities innovate to survive amid depopulation, Tokyo draw
One day in mid-May, Benjamin Peters, vice president of a university in Miyazaki Prefecture, asked some students in English to explain the differences in thought between Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Hobbes. The seven students, who had read English books on the philosophers to prepare for ...
