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Kyodo news summary -8-(Japan Economic Newswire Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) TOKYO, Dec. 24 -- (Kyodo) _ ---------- Japan Cabinet OKs record 92.4 tril. yen budget for FY 2011 TOKYO - The Cabinet of Prime Minister Naoto Kan approved Friday a record-high draft budget of 92.41 trillion yen ($1.11 trillion) for the next fiscal year, driven by swelling social security costs as the population ages and the need to spend on election pledges by his ruling party. The size of the initial budget for fiscal 2011 starting April grew 0.1 percent from the previous high of 92.30 for fiscal 2010. This could add to fears over the country's fiscal health since the government could only cover less than half of the expenditures with tax revenues and depended on debt for the remainder. ---------- Japan to cut foreign aid in general account for 12th straight yr TOKYO - Japan decided Friday to cut its overall foreign aid by 7.4 percent from a year earlier to 572.7 billion yen in the fiscal 2011 general account budget, registering the 12th straight year of decrease. But the whole volume of Japan's official development assistance, including aid financed by special accounts and contributions to some international aid organizations, marked an increase of around 1 percent from a year before to 1.93 trillion yen in calendar 2011. ---------- Japan's per-capita GDP rises to 16th place among OECD members TOKYO - Japan's nominal gross domestic product per capita stood at $39,530 (about 3.7 million yen) in 2009, rising to 16th place from 19th the preceding year among the 34 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the government said Friday. The Cabinet Office traced the rise up the ranks to the yen's appreciation against the dollar, which inflated the dollar-denominated number and thereby caused Japan to overtake Iceland, Britain and Italy. ---------- Itochu begins to distribute e-comics to iPhone users in N. America TOKYO - Itochu Corp. said Friday it has started to distribute electronic Japanese manga comics to users of Apple Inc.'s iPhone smartphones in North America. It is initially offering about 30 titles including "KamenRider" and "Cyborg009"by Shotaro Ishinomori and "Bonobono" by Mikio Igarashi. The minimum price is set at 99 cents, or 82 yen. Free contents are available for trial. ---------- Japan's outstanding debt to rise to record 891 tril. yen in FY 2011 TOKYO - The outstanding balance of state and local government debt at the end of fiscal 2011 is expected to rise to a record-high 891 trillion yen, or 184 percent of Japan's gross domestic product, the government said Friday, which would leave the country with the highest level of public debt among major economies. Of the total, debt owed by the central government through bonds will stand at around 668 trillion yen, the Finance Ministry said, equivalent to 5.24 million yen per person. ---------- No. of teachers suffering stress hits largest level in 2009: survey TOKYO - The number of public school teachers in Japan who took sick leave due to depression and other mental disorders in the academic year through March 2010 rose for the 17th straight year to set a record high, an education ministry survey said Friday. The number of such teachers at elementary schools as well as junior and senior high schools totaled 5,458, up 58 from the preceding year, accounting for 63 percent of the 8,627 teachers who took sick leave during the year, according to the Education, Sports, Culture, Science and Technology Ministry. ---------- Organizational issues cause evidence-tampering scandal TOKYO - A team from the Supreme Public Prosecutors Office acknowledged Friday that an evidence-tampering scandal involving senior Osaka prosecutors stemmed from "organizational issues" as they neglected to pay attention to inconvenient evidence and supervisors failed to appropriately oversee the investigation. In its final report submitted to an advisory panel to the justice minister, the team said that as preventive measures, parts of interrogations by special investigative squads at district public prosecutors offices will be audio-visually recorded from next spring. ---------- Toshiba to outsource chip production to Samsung TOKYO - Toshiba Corp. will outsource its unprofitable business of producing semiconductors for digital home appliances to Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea as part of efforts to restructure its chip-related operations, company officials said Friday. Toshiba plans to engage only in designing the system large-scale integration chips so it can concentrate resources on its memory chip business, which is seeing growing demand for use in smartphones, the officials said. The company will also sell a semiconductor plant to Sony Corp. and build a factory to produce liquid crystal panels for Apple Inc.'s iPhones. ---------- Weekday highway tolls for standard cars to be set at 2,000 yen TOKYO - Transport minister Sumio Mabuchi and Koichiro Gemba, policy chief of the Democratic Party of Japan, agreed Friday to set an upper limit for expressway tolls for standard-sized cars on weekdays at 2,000 yen while retaining the current 1,000 yen limit on weekends and national holidays, officials said. The government will aim to introduce the new rate, to be applied only to cars equipped with electronic toll collection systems, next April and to retain it for more than two years. ---------- Dollar pauses near 83 yen line in Tokyo ahead of holidays TOKYO - The U.S. dollar hovered around the 83 yen line Friday in Tokyo, unable to recoup its losses in New York in the absence of major trading cues ahead of the Christmas holiday period. At 5 p.m., the dollar fetched 82.96-98 yen, compared with 82.87-97 yen in New York at 5 p.m. Thursday and 83.68-70 yen in Tokyo at 5 p.m. Wednesday. Thursday was a national holiday in Japan. (c) 2010 Kyodo News International, Inc. |