Georgia Asian Times November 15-30, 2017
Page 17
Misc Asia
China pledges another three years of ‘toilet revolution’ to boost tourism Beijing, Nov 19, 2017 — China announced today plans to build and upgrade 64,000 public toilets between 2018 to 2020 as part of its “toilet revolution” aimed at boosting tourism and lifting the sector’s contribution to economic growth. China has been keen to develop and expand services industries to move away from debt-fuelled and investment-driven growth, while offsetting the impact of persistently weak global demand for its exports. Particularly, it has been looking at the emerging tourism industry, pledging late last year 2 trillion yuan in investment which it hopes will help lift the sector’s contribution to annual economic growth. While three years of “toilet revolution” have led to “significant achievements”, according to the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA), the booming industry’s prospects are clouded by wide-spread complaints
about toilet hygiene levels at China’s tourist sites. Since 2015, China has poured 1.04 billion yuan into building and renovating 68,000 toilets, far exceeding its three-year goal of 57,000, state news agency Xinhua said. “The toilet revolution ... is an urgent and necessary measure to transform and upgrade our tourism industry,” CNTA director Li Jinzao was quoted by Xinhua as saying. Under the new initiative, China will have 47,000 toilets built and 17,000 existing ones refurbished in the next three years, Xinhua said.
Japan railway ‘deeply sorry’ after train leaves 20 seconds early Tokyo, Nov 17, 2017 — A Japanese railway operator has issued a deep apology for the “tremendous nuisance” caused by a train departing 20 seconds early, surprising even a nation renowned for both punctuality and politeness. The Tsukuba Express train linking Tokyo and the capital’s northern suburbs pulled out of Minami Nagareyama Station at 9:44:20 instead of 9:44:40. “We deeply apologize for causing tremendous nuisance to customers,” said the Tsukuba Express company. “There was no complaint from customers over this incident,” said the firm, which added that no one missed the train due to the early departure. Japanese railway services, including shinkansen bullet trains, are famous for their world-beating punctuality. Even the slightest delay prompts an effusive apology from the train guard, which often lasts longer than the holdup itself.
With trains running the same route every few minutes to cope with huge numbers of passengers, even brief delays can back up the whole network causing overcrowding. The apology had several social media users scratching their heads. “A weird country in which a 20-second difference prompts a sincere apology while faking quality data on aluminium and steel products or misconduct on car check-ups are done just like that,” read one tweet. This was a reference to a recent string of corporate scandals that has floored the reputation of Japan Inc. Car giants Nissan and Subaru have admitted that uncertified staff had inspected vehicles while Kobe Steel has been embroiled in a quality data-faking scandal.