More than half of Japan's leading newspapers have called for the abolition of nuclear power, a study has shown, and separately some news editors have admitted they could have covered the 2011 disaster better.
More than half of Japan's leading newspapers have called for the abolition of nuclear power, a study has shown, and separately some news editors have admitted they could have covered the 2011 disaster better.
At a recent meeting in Naha, Okinawa Prefecture, representatives from Japanese newspapers, television and publishing discussed their coverage of last year's magnitude-9.0 earthquake and tsunami, and of the nuclear industry.
"In the immediate aftermath, the media relayed information from the central government and from Tokyo Electric Power Co., but there was little independent reporting," said Tsukasa Oba, the city news editor at Tokyo Shimbun. "We had failed to create other channels of information based on the assumption that an accident could occur. That led to criticism that news reports were like those controlled by the imperial Japanese military during World War II."
The Sept. 26 to 28 meeting was the 56th in a series; 290 media representatives attended.
In one session focusing on last year's disaster, Ken Fujimori, a journalism professor at Senshu University in Tokyo, released the results of a study of newspaper and TV coverage of the events of March 2011.
It analyzed editorials relating to nuclear policy from 46 newspapers nationwide between March 12, 2011, and Aug. 4, 2012.
A total of 28 newspapers, or 61 percent, ran editorials calling for a move away from nuclear energy toward an entirely nuclear-free future. These included The Asahi Shimbun, The Mainichi Shimbun, and Tokyo Shimbun and Chunichi Shimbun (the last pair were counted as one because they share editorial policy).
Editorials in 14 newspapers, or 30 percent, called for a gradual decrease in reliance on nuclear energy. Nihon Keizai Shimbun, Chugoku Shimbun and Fukushima Minyu were among the newspapers that took this line.
Two newspapers-The Yomiuri Shimbun and The Sankei Shimbun-favored maintaining nuclear energy, while another two-Fukushima Minpo and Fukui Shimbun-did not declare an opinion.
The meeting heard criticism of how newspapers chose to cover the quake and tsunami. In particular, they tended to focus heavily on a few communities, including Kesennuma, Ishinomaki and Minami-Sanriku in Miyagi Prefecture, and comparatively ignored others.
"Reflecting on that criticism, we have begun going to small temporary housing facilities that were not covered as much until now to listen to what residents have to say," said Tomoyuki Sasaki, who is in charge of disaster coverage at Tohoku Broadcasting Co.
At least one editor addressed how the evacuees story is developing.
"With 160,000 evacuees having moved within the prefecture or outside it, divisions have developed," said Jun Sakuma, the city news editor at Fukushima Minpo. "Differences have arisen between evacuees and family members who decided to stay at home, and emotional problems have appeared at evacuation sites over such matters as the disposal of garbage."
Sakuma said the paper has decided to aggressively print residents' opinions and highlight problems for the central and prefectural governments. He said it had also run articles about the need to test all bags of rice produced in Fukushima for radioactivity.
But regarding the effects of radiation, Sakuma said, "I get the feeling that Tokyo-based national newspapers are focusing on the risks, so I think reporting that may lead to excessive worries could be inappropriate."
Discussion also saw editors criticize past attitudes toward nuclear safety.
"In the immediate aftermath of the accident, we were really under the gun trying to transmit primary information," Tokyo-based editorial writer Yojiro Ikawa of The Yomiuri Shimbun told one panel discussion. "Media organizations must reflect on excessive faith in the safety myth, which led us to believe that no severe accident would ever occur."
(This article was written by Hiroshi Kawamoto, a senior staff writer, and Hideki Shiga.)