日: 2023年8月5日

1. Japan’s weather officials continue to urge people in Okinawa Prefecture to be on high alert as Typhoon Khanun nears the region’s Miyakojima Island. The typhoon has left two people dead and more than 60 others injured in the prefecture. Officials are calling for caution against high waves and storm surges.
2. The European Union, Norway and Iceland on Thursday lifted all import restrictions on Japanese food products that had been implemented following the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries says it welcomes the removal of the restrictions as it will boost reconstruction efforts in the areas affected by the nuclear disaster. 3. A variety of colorful fireworks lit the night sky over Nagaoka City in central Japan as one of the country’s most popular fireworks festivals opened on Wednesday. The two-day Nagaoka Fireworks Festival started at 7:20 p.m. with the release of three white fireworks, carrying with them a wish for peace. The long-standing event honors those who died in an air raid in 1945 and prays for recovery from a major earthquake that struck the area in 2004.

1. Data from Japan’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency show 7, 235 heatstroke patients were taken to hospital nationwide in June. The figure is the second largest for the month of June since the statistics began in 2010, following 15,969 recorded in June of last year.　 2. A Japanese government panel has proposed that the country’s average hourly minimum wage for this fiscal year be raised above 1,000 yen, or about seven dollars and 20 cents for the first time. The labor ministry panel members, including representatives from unions and corporate management, had been discussing a minimum wage hike to match the rising cost of living.
3. Policymakers at the Bank of Japan say they are introducing greater flexibility in their yield-curve control policy, or YCC. But they are otherwise leaving their ultra-loose program unchanged.