'I hate whale meat,' Japan's PM confides: report

'I hate whale meat,' Japan's PM confides: report


TOKYO (AFP) – Japan's Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has revealed he dislikes whale meat, a newspaper reported Saturday, in an unusual confession for the prime minister of a country that defies Western criticism of whaling.



"I hate whale meat," Hatoyama said during a meeting with his visiting Dutch counterpart Jan Peter Balkenende on Monday at the prime minister's office, the Sankei Shimbun reported.



The Netherlands is one of several anti-whaling countries that allows the radical environmental group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society to register a vessel in the country.



The group's activists have repeatedly harassed Japanese whaling vessels in Antarctic waters. During the last hunt a Sea Shepherd vessel collided with a whaling ship, sparking allegations that the group was behaving irresponsibly.



Despite Hatoyama's reported dislike of whale meat, however, he urged Balkenende to take action against the group over its attacks on Japanese whalers in the Antarctic, government officials said.



Japan hunts whales by using a loophole in the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling that allows "lethal research" on the creatures, but makes no secret of the fact that the meat often ends up on dining tables.



Tokyo often accuses Western critics of insensitivity toward its culture and heritage.



Hatoyama's centre-left government, which took office in October, has deviated little from the pro-whaling policies adopted by the previous administration, which had traditionally close ties with farmers and fishermen.

Bad breath fights monsters at Japan whacky fair

by Miwa Suzuki Miwa Suzuki

Thu Oct 22, 9:09 am ET



TOKYO (AFP) – A monster-slaying bad breath blow gun, a rain-simulating "funbrella" and a navigation-aid helmet that steers users by pulling their ears: welcome to Japan's latest whacky inventions.



These bizarre gadgets and more -- some of them useful, most of them fun -- went on display at the Digital Content Expo, a fair showcasing futuristic gaming, arts, medical and other technologies that opened on Thursday.



A clear crowd-pleaser at the four-day event was a blowgun videogame by the Kanazawa Institute of Technology where the enemies are a scary line-up of monsters including a vampire, a bat and a club-wielding ogre.



Rather than fire bullets, darts or lasers at the fearsome adversaries, players of all ages eat snacks and sip drinks to boost the smell of their breath, then blast stinky bad breath balls at the screen to kill the monsters.



"Your children may shun you when you come home reeking of alcohol, but this could make you a family hero," said Yusuke Sasayama, a Kanazawa Institute engineering student and one of the brains behind the game.



Osaka University graduate students, meanwhile, wowed audiences with their "Funbrella" -- the perfect gift for people who hate sunny days -- which uses a technology the inventors called the "tele-rain" system.



A vibrating device on the gadget simulates the sensation of raindrops hitting the umbrella, and there are advanced settings for hails of marbles, snakes and other objects that don't usually fall from the sky.



"With this 'Funbrella' you could feel an Amazon downpour in the desert," said Yoshifumi Kitamura, associate professor at the university.



He also suggested it could help lovers who are separated by vast distances to share the feeling of braving a rainstorm together as they talk by telephone.



For those with little sense of direction, Yuichiro Kojima, a researcher at the University of Electro-Communications, has come up with an alternative to GPS and navigation systems or the humble compass and map.



His head-mounted device steers users by gently pulling their ears.



One team member said it was inspired by "parents towing their children and pulling their ears, which allows you to lead people with gentle force."



In one of the breakthroughs at the show, electronic powerhouse Sony Corp. showed off a world-first device -- a cylindrical three-dimensional display where the image can be viewed from any angle.



"It is unprecedented that you can see a 3D image from 360 degrees and in full colour," Sony spokeswoman Saori Takahashi said of the device, about the size of a coffee machine.



"This could be used for education or as a 3D photo frame in the future," she said. "If we can adapt this for motion pictures, it would lead to a 3D video-phone or to virtual pets."

Japan Police Blame Hunger for Store Robberies

By Stuart Biggs



Oct. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Holdups at convenience stores in Japan rose this year as robbers focus on stealing food rather than cash because of hunger, the Yomiuri newspaper reported today, citing the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department.



The number of convenience store robberies in Tokyo in the nine months to September more than doubled from a year earlier, the newspaper said. Nationwide, there were 487 robberies nationwide in the first half of the year, up 66 percent from 2008, the report said.



Store robberies are rising because of the recession and the number of people facing dire poverty, the newspaper reported, citing unidentified police officials. Out of 30 people arrested for 44 cases in Tokyo, 16 were unemployed, the report said.



A 42-year-old jobless man threatened a Tokyo store clerk with a knife before stealing rice balls and liquor worth 2,600 yen ($28) in September, the report said. About 60 percent of those arrested in Tokyo don’t have enough money to last a day, the Yomiuri cited a police official as saying.

Pouring cold water on fashionista swimmers

Pouring cold water on fashionista swimmers


Wed Oct 21, 11:15 am ET
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan's swimmers could face lifetime bans if they dye their hair, wear an earring or have brightly decorated fingernails.
Japanese officials have launched a strict policy to prevent athletes turning up for competitions looking more like rock stars than swimmers.
Male and female swimmers caught sneaking into each others rooms at Japanese training camp, where the sexes have separate sleeping quarters, will also find themselves in hot water.
"The United States and Australia are also setting these criteria," the Japan Swimming Federation's executive director Masafumi Izumi told local media Wednesday.
"We have had many recent controversies (in Japan) with marijuana in sport and at universities, and this is about swimming taking a stand on its own initiative."
The JSF's stringent new plan has been written into its charter following an executive board meeting Tuesday and swimmers will have to sign a letter of oath.
Rule-breakers face being booted out of the team and sent home in disgrace, a suspension of up to five years or even a lifetime ban.
"It is more an enhancement of the rules," the JSF told Reuters. "It's a policy top swimming countries like Australia and the Americans follow."

罰ゲーム ダウンタウン おもしろ

Blue roses to debut in Japan

Blue roses to debut in Japan


 AFP – An employee of Japan's beverage giant Suntory holds a bunch of their genetically modified roses at … Tue Oct 20, 8:10 am ET

TOKYO (AFP) – Which colour would you like your roses? Red, white, yellow ... or perhaps blue? Japan's Suntory Ltd. said Tuesday it would start selling the world's first genetically-modified blue roses next month, 20 years after it began research to create the novelty flowers.



The major whisky distiller said it succeeded in developing blue roses in 2004 with the Australian biotech company Florigene Pty Ltd.



The blue roses are created by implanting the gene that leads to the synthesis of the blue pigment Delphinidin in pansies, the firm said.



The product was approved by the Japanese government in 2008 on the basis of an international agreement on biosafety. It took one year for the company to establish its production and marketing systems, Suntory said.



Named Applause, the new variety is "recommended as a luxurious gift for special occasions such as wedding anniversaries and birthdays", the company said.



They are expected to be priced between 2,000 and 3,000 yen (22 and 33 dollars) per stem, about 10 times more expensive than normal roses in Japan.



There are no current plans to sell the new variety overseas

Panasonic’s Solar Power Status Symbols Turn Japan’s Rich Green

By Mariko Yasu and Maki Shiraki



Oct. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Forget the 58-inch flat-panel TV, the new domestic status symbol for Japan’s rich is a cooker.



Housewife Yasuyo Takizawa, whose husband runs a public- relations firm, spent as much as 4 million yen ($44,900) on systems that combine solar power with energy-efficient water and room heaters and induction cookers that heat pots with a magnetic field, boosting her green credentials and swelling earnings for manufacturer Panasonic Corp.



“I’m not normally big on the environment, but I feel good that I’m using eco-friendly products,” said Takizawa, 63, who installed the system after seeing it at her sister’s house. “Now my friends who visit my place say they also want them.” She’s buying the same units for a house being built for her son.



Turning its white goods business green may help Panasonic double sales from home-products in a decade, said Kazuharu Miura, an analyst at Daiwa Institute of Research Ltd. The Osaka-based company, Japan’s biggest maker of home appliances, is blitzing magazines and Web sites with recruitment ads to staff its 18,000 branded neighborhood stores -- key to providing the technical support the solar systems require.



Panasonic’s home-products unit earned 49 billion yen last year, outdoing divisions making televisions and stereos, electrical components and homes. Revenue at the unit was 1.2 trillion yen, 15 percent of the company’s overall sales. The company is also seeking to buy Sanyo Electric Co., a Japanese maker of solar panels and rechargeable batteries, for $9 billion.



Green Seminars



Panasonic and its store managers marketed energy efficient products to 800,000 customers in 2,800 seminars in the five months to Aug. 31, according to Mitsuo Osawa, a director at Panasonic’s electric works unit. Sales of such appliances for households in Japan will rise to 2.75 trillion yen in the two years to March 2011, from 2.13 trillion yen in the previous two years, according to data provided by Osawa and Japan’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy.



“Energy-saving products can not only stimulate consumer demand but also boost the overall appliance market, as they are generally sold at a higher price,” said Kazunori Takami, president of Panasonic’s home appliance company.



The backbone of Panasonic’s plan is its chain of own-brand, shopping-street stores. Set up more than half a century ago to sell the company’s televisions, washing machines and air conditioners, the stores have been in decline since peaking at about 27,000 in 1980, as warehouse chains like Yamada Denki Co. captured customers with discounts. The local shops now account for about 30 percent of Panasonic’s sales in Japan.



‘A Fortune’



“The shops are a fortune to us,” Takami said. “They can offer the maintenance services that will be crucial to expand this business.”



Panasonic, whose shares have risen 14 percent in Tokyo trading this year, has the largest network of consumer electronics shops in Japan. There are about 1,000 Sony-branded shops and 2,700 for Sanyo Electric Co., the companies said.



“Panasonic is eyeing expansion of the appliance business as its next growth driver, as the audio-visual equipment market starts to saturate,” said Daiwa’s Miura. The company doubled TV sales in the past 10 years with the switch to more expensive flat-panel screens, he said. “That situation can be recreated with eco-friendly home appliances.”



Panasonic’s EcoCute, a water heater that extracts heat from the air, costs around 800,000 yen, four times more than a conventional gas boiler. Panasonic’s induction cooking range costs about 400,000 yen, double that of a typical gas system.



Most of Japan’s 50 million households use gas for cooking and warming water. The number using only electricity will likely increase by 1.5 million to 5 million in the two years to March 2011, Osawa said. Those with solar systems will probably increase by at least 200,000, to 660,000, in the same time, each spending about 2.5 million yen for the equipment, he said.



Sanyo Strategy



Panasonic will likely start a major campaign for its “Panasonic for the entire house” strategy after completing the acquisition of Sanyo Electric, Miura said.



The acquisition will help combine appliances with solar cells, fuel cells and rechargeable batteries “to offer a unique service that no other rival can replicate,” President Fumio Ohtsubo said at the annual shareholder meeting on June 25.



Electronics retailers like Yamada Denki, Japan’s biggest by revenue, are fighting back. In December, the company increased its stake to 100 percent from 51 percent in Cosmos Berry’s Co., a franchise of 1,014 local electric-goods outlets. In August, the retailer teamed up with Hiroshima-based contractor West Holdings Corp. to offer solar power installation.



“We are aiming to expand our coverage to areas and consumers that large outlets cannot reach,” said Hisashi Yamada, a spokesman for the Gunma-based retailer.



Solar Sales



Sales of solar cells, fuel cells, energy-saving lighting and energy-efficient heating systems in Japan will probably more than double to 1.4 trillion yen in 9 years to 2017, Fuji Keizai Co., a private researcher in Tokyo, said in a June 9 statement.



Japan is encouraging consumers to invest in solar power by forcing utilities to buy surplus domestic electricity at above- market rates. Government incentives for renewable energy may boost solar sales in Japan 20-fold by 2020, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analysts Hiroyuki Sakaida and Ikuo Matsuhashi said in August.



Watching her solar control panel, Takizawa said income from her surplus pays for more than 70 percent of her monthly power bill and will double next month with new tariffs.



“It’s fun to check how much electricity we are producing,” she said.