Science and Technology Policy Japan

A planning committee for the 2025 World Expo in Osaka held its first meeting Friday afternoon, with members emphasizing that the event should be a collaborative effort involving the broader Kansai region and an occasion to showcase Japan’s cutting-edge technologies.

The Justice Ministry said they have stripped manufacturing giants Mitsubishi Motors Corp. and Panasonic Corp. of accreditation to accept foreign trainees under the Technical Intern Training Program, for ordering such workers to perform tasks other than those specified in their contracts and other violations.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was to express his intention to seek an international agreement on the reduction of plastic waste in his keynote speech at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday morning, according to sources.

The central government will strengthen its financial support for programs in which elementary, junior high and high school students stay in the countryside in communities centered on farming, forestry and fishing.

The government is launching a new initiative aimed at growing the number of foreigners who want to use their experience studying in Japan to start businesses here.

Japan has taken a step toward policing foreign technology companies under the same communication privacy rules that govern domestic companies, responding to a string of personal data breaches around the globe.

Japan’s strategy of promoting nuclear exports will not change following Hitachi Ltd.’s decision to suspend a nuclear power plant construction project in Britain, industry minister Hiroshige Seko said Friday.

The Japanese government will revise cybersecurity guidelines for 14 areas of infrastructure, including electricity grids and waterways, by this spring. The review had been planned for after the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, but increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks have prompted officials to bring forward the change.

Japan will help build "smart cities" across Southeast Asia, using artificial intelligence and networked devices to tackle problems like road congestion and energy conservation.

The government is considering beefing up its monitoring activities over remote islands that define Japan’s territorial waters and exclusive economic zones using images captured by state-controlled satellites, government officials said Saturday.