hello and welcome to nhk newsline. people in many japanese prefectures have woken up to a new normal. the government announced thursday night it was lifting a nationwide state of emergency for 39 of japan's 47 prefectures. families were really to take a ride at a local theme park.

staff ramped up antivirus precautions including extra cleaning and temperature checks at the entrance. people lined up for a dip and the business opened for the first time since last month after emergency measures were eased. >> i'm glad it's open again. i wanted to relax. >> many regions are also expecting a spike in traffic on public transportation. flshl. >> they're trying to ensure that passengers protect themselves and others bypassing out masks to anyone not wearing one but some say they're not ready to get back in business. this traditional japanese hotel won't welcome guests until at

least the end of june. since we don't expect many customers to come right away we have to remain closed and look to the future. >> the prime minister urges people to stay calm. >> we need to brace ourselves for the possibility of the second and third wave of infection. if there is a renewed threat the state ofmergency may needs to be declared again in effected areas. >> the government says it will continue the state of emergency for the 8 remaining prefectures next week. the worst hit place in the country is the capital. he has rules for easing the

request after the state of emergency was lifted. on a weekly average, there must be fewer than 20 new infections a day with a percentage of untraceable cases below 50%. >> if all three indndicators fe below the target we'll make a comprehensive assessmentt takin into account other indicators. we'll need stay home and business extension requests. >> the easing will take place in phases after the central government lifts the state of emergency. but she warned that if any of the criteria exceed the set limit she will issue whatt she calls a tokyoyo alert to urge people to exercise vigilance. in japan more than 16,000 people

tested positive for the coronavirus. nearly a third of those cases have been reported in tokyo. as part of a government bid to speed up testing, new test kits for the coronavirus began arriving in hospitals on friday. the results of the antigen tests will be available in 30 minutes. the new test kits were approved by the health ministry on wednesday. they are used at 1,300 medical institutions in the country. the national center for global health and medicine in tokyo is one of them. it does not require conventional skills but the c conventional p tests. a samplee will be applieded to kit.t. if a linine appears, that means person is infected. medicacal experts say this will speed up testingng and treatmen. however t the tests are less accurate and people whose results are negativee will bebe

askeked too take a pcr tetest. >> the directors of the department of infectious diseases saiaid he had been waiting for the new method. >> there were strong calls to do something about the situation. as more equal treatment might be delayed. this is a test. >> the company says it expects to supply 200,000 a week across the country. >> the debate is heating up on whether to readmit taiwan as an observer at the world health organization. the annual assembly is set to cop convene for monday. discussions at the world health assembly will focus on ways to fight the coronavirus pandemic. taiwan lost it's observer status

in 2017 and is aiming to rejoin the proceedings this year. authorities in beijing strongly object to taiwan's participation arguing the territory is part of china. >> there's no legal basis in the who constitution or the rules governing the annual conference to justify the participation as an observer at the southern state. >> the united states and japan are among the countries supporting taiwan participation. the u.s. senate unanimously passed a resolution on the topic. meanwhile, u.s. president donald trump said thursday he is preparing to take new measures against the who. the trump administration has temporarily cutoff funding to the agency and accused it of having a china centered stance. president trump i is taking his defenses on china to the next level sayining he could cutoff e whole relationship.

trump madee the comment on thursday duringg an interview o fox business networks mornings with maria when asked about the chinese president xi jingping trump said he had a good relationship adding that righth now he doeoesn't want to speak him. trump's recentnt shift t toward anti-china rhetoric may put at risk a trade deal his administration fought hard to create. the president said the virus came from china and that countries should have stopped it from spreading. china denies any responsibility about the global economy saying it took appropriate steps to control it's outbreak. the latest figures from johns hopkins university indicates the u.s. leads the world in

confirmed cases and deaths. worldwide it's surpassed 4.4 million. >> as many states restart their economies the u.s. centers for disease control and prevention is providing guidelines to help businenesses achools decide if ththey're ready to reopen. the checklist first asked if there's recommendation to monitor symptoms and maiaintain social diststancing.. the cdc s says restaurants, schools, and other work places should only reopen if they can meet all the requirements but it has no way to enforce the rules. that has some heaealth experts doubting whether the guidelines will be of much use.

countries around the world are struggling contain the coronavirus but china managed to emerge from the outbreak and some business activities have resumed. officials in beijing have come out with key economic indicators for april. production bounced into the positive gaining 3.9% from the same month last year. meanwhile, retail sales also improved but remained in negative territory down 7.5%. >> we spoke with hsbc that pointed to a lag between strong supply and weak demand. >> it's interesting. we havave actually very strtron balance in industrial production last month. much more than expected but on the retail side, the demand side

things are still l lging so there's an interesting divurgence here between supply coming back quickly and demand still not catching up fully. >> nenewman notes that many consumers remain cautiousus. > those worries about the virus,s, for example, some peop have lost their jobs, other people have seen that decline so this caution on the demand side, on the come assumer side, we'll probably take some time to fully erase. >> china's central bank has been boosting stimulus. the government also needs to step up i it's game. >> we need aggressive physical stimulus as well. in china, w we see a bit of tha coming through already. we see example reports in infrastructure spending and in the grand scheme of things probably more needs to be done and one priority here would be

direct aid to the consumers. >> we usually have an idea of what c comes out of the nationa people's congress. this time around it's different. indications are that top policy makers are still debatingg the right for strong economic response too covivi19 and our expectation is that we'll see probably a signal toward more stimulus, particularly on the spending side of the government. particularly as we mentioned with regards to consumers but we don't know at this point. >> despite the uncertainty, newman expects china's economy to grow this year. >> our forecast is only 1.7% and that's way below what we are seeing in past years. it might seem shockingly low but in the global context this is

actually a fairly strong number and does help the global economy but it'ss so sharp that china alone cannot rest. what you need to have is every single economy in the world applying fiscal and monetary stimulus as well and doing as much as they can to revise their own economies. >> people in western and central japan are facing a wet saturday, drenching rains and strong winds could hit the region. our meteorologist joins u us wi the details.s. > yes, withh the arrivalal o frfrontal system we are now seeg heavy raiainfall in parts of th regigion. take a look at this radadar. this mornining, it wasas calm b right now, red and yellow indicating heavy rain are popppping up in the northern h. in fact, the parts of nagasaki prefecture saw it in only three hours making the heaviest for

the month of may. we have a frontal system. this system was dropping heavy rainfall and this one will go to the south of the southern half. we'll see very heavy rainfall into saturday and as you can see, rainfall also spreads past and we'll start to see rain tomorrow morning and that will continue into the evening hours. again, the south will receive the heaviest rain up to 180 millimeters of rain could fall in just 24 hours, a month's worth of rain could fall. that could lead to flooding. and as for tokyo, the height has been above 25% over the last six days but cooling down to the teens on saturday thanks to the rainy weather. it's going to be warming up once again on sunday but as opposed to this week it's going to beben the chilly side. starting on your monday it will be in the low 20s every day into the rest of the work week. meanwhile, we have been monit

monitoring vongfong. it has been weakened to a severe tropical storm there. no heavy rain is now pounding the northern half of the philippines. especially also receiving rainfall. the system is packing wind gusts at 44 kilometers per hour. it's still pretty powerful and it's expected to stay over the philippines at least into saturday. that's it for me.

>> thank you very much for joining us. 9 years ago this month a earthquake devastated japan. today we take a look at the persisting environmental damage on land and in the sea and how those in the affected area are still struggling to deal with the situation.

still we go to the coast of ofunato city. the waves that struck this area were up to 40 meters high and caused destruction. this footage was shot about 18 months after the disaster. things appear to have returned to normal but what's happening below the surface? diving into the area below the bay, nhk world wataru sumida decided to find out. >> i'm about 10 meters under water off the coast. take a look over here.

some of them are five meters wide and weigh about 60 pounds each. persistent efforts have opinion made. for example, this small black spikey thing is a sea urchin. >> this was about 50 meters from here and all you can see are sea

urchins. experts believe it. and the seaweed destroyining th habitat of utter marine creatures. to restore the marine life which provides the region's famous

food. one of the marine creatures disappearing is a much prized seafood in japan. before the 2011 disaster they were a big money maker for local fishermen. today their numbers have plunged and while they're also a much loved food that's no comfort for fisheries. >> last month, local fishermen gathered for a meeting in n the city. their reports were not good. the hall of the local specialty was about one third of that before the tsunami.

>> they would have been trying to clear the sea floor of urchins for five years now. on this day they caught more than 500 in just 30 minutes. it's empty. urchins would normally be snapped up by supermarkets and restaurants. these however failed to mature because of the lack of seaweed. >> they're too small and unfit for market. we have no choice but to get rid of them. >> they wait for the stores to

take root. three months later, it's grown to about 10 centimeters. >> it will take a long time to show results, if any, maybe 10 or 20 years but we must take action to protect our sea. >> a group of researchers is studying ways to transform them into an edible product. they're malnourished. the team is looking for the best food to increase their size. they are fed the stems of seaweed. or a mixture of seaweed and fish meat to study how they grow.

the final results show a big difference in size. the one given the feed mix have much more flesh. they continue their study. the next goal is to improve the taste. >> we aim to make sea urchins as profitable as before instead of just getting rid of them as something that harms the local fishing industry. >> the fishing industry in japan's northeast spent many years getting back on its feet. on top of collapsing ecosystems the nuclear accident banned consumer fears about food safety but by addressing each of the issues the industry is slowly but surely being revived. the fishing catch for the region is now about 70% of predisaster levels and sales revenue is

close to a full recovery. moving on to dry land. farmers in the northeast have been battling a different kind of environmental challenge. in some areas, it's on the way inland washing away the precious topsoil. in it's place it can be replaced by another one. they fight to revival their land and rebuild their lives. >> he managed to get back t to work but he still struggles.

>> it's hard to grow anything better. >> he is improving it's problem. it has meant transplanting huge amounts of soil. but he says now the quality of the spinach is touchy. only about 70% can be shipped to market. the problem is drainage. because topsoil, the government brought in from nearby mountains contained it. >> this soil is too moist. it holds it's shape but it should crumble in your hands. that means the roots are getting too much water. this is not good at all.

>> across the road, his neighbor gave up on harvesting his cabbage crop. he believes the roots decayed because of the damp earth. local officials added a layer of sand to the fields last yea butt the farmers say that hasn't helped much. >> i got fed up with it. it would be good if i could grow better product. >> another problem facing the industry is the number of farmers. there's currently about 600 farmers. the number has fallen to about half of what it was before.

they're trying to consolidate them but many land owners have found other jobs since 2011. >> even though there are many plots of land available there's hardly anyone to rent farm land from. >> he might have given up to. if it wasn't for his sons. they have seen many hardships including trying to find it. however, he is determined to r persevere along side the generation. he says he takes pride in his job having to produce something that's key to sustaining human life. >> i think the number of people in the industry by myself enjoy farming and if i can show them

that i enjoy it. >> it will take even more time until life returns to what it was like. nhk world. a large number of farmers will make it even harder to revive agricultural in that area but there's a small trickle of people moving the other way. some young office workers decided northeast japan is the place to start a new life. one newcomer from tokyo set up a winery. he is already holding events with locally grown food. another has started growing organic vegetables. there's still a long way to go but the combination of new blood and soil offers hope.

hope that the region won't just survive but thrive. and that's all for today's newsline in depth. thanks for tuning in and make sure to do so next time too.

>> the frerench prime minisiste pledges equal access for everyone regarding an eventual covid-19 vaccine. the c.e.o. had suggested the u.s. would get priority. a whistleblower removed from his post for criticizing the u.s. government's level of pandemic preparedness warns of a dark winter ahead unless you are -- urgent action is taken. plus france's big museums might have been closed since march but some smaller museums are now reopening.