TOKYO (AFP) – Rice prices in Japan last month were almost twice what they were a year earlier, official data showed Friday, as core inflation accelerated in the world’s number four economy.
The price of the grain has soared in recent months, prompting Japan’s government to release some of its emergency stockpile into the market.
Excluding fresh food, consumer prices rose 3.2 per cent in March year-on-year compared to 3.0 per cent in February — in line with market expectations.
Excluding energy as well, prices rose 2.9 per cent last month, up from 2.6 per cent in February. But overall inflation eased to 3.6 per cent from 3.7 per cent.
The data is likely to strengthen expectations that the Bank of Japan will hike interest rates, with inflation above the BoJ’s target of two percent for almost three years.
However, uncertainty caused by US President Donald Trump’s trade policies could prompt the central bank to stick to its current stance for now.
This photo taken on February 18, 2025 shows a man walking past sacks of government stockpiled rice piled up in a warehouse in Saitama prefecture, north of Tokyo. PHOTO: AFP
The internal affairs ministry said that the prices of both fresh and non-fresh food products rose, as did hotel fees.
But grain prices saw the biggest increase, rising 25.4 per cent. Rice prices logged an enormous 92.5-per cent jump, driven by a shortage of the staple.
Rice shock
Factors behind the shortfall include poor harvests due to hot weather in 2023 and panic-buying prompted by a “megaquake” warning last year.
Record numbers of tourists have also been blamed for a rise in consumption while some traders are believed to be hoarding the grain.
The government began auctioning its rice stockpile last month, the first time since it was started in 1995.
The government has so far released around 210,000 tonnes and plans to auction another 100,000 tons this month, authorities said earlier this month.
Rice also appears to have been a factor in Trump’s hefty tariffs of 24 per cent on Japanese imports — currently paused — into the United States.
The White House has accused Japan of imposing a 700-per cent tariff on US rice imports, a claim that Japan’s farm minister called “incomprehensible”.
But it’s not just rice; cabbage prices have also exploded, including by 111.6 per cent in March compared to the same month last year.
Last year’s record summer heat and heavy rain ruined crops, driving up the cost of the leafy green in what media have dubbed a “cabbage shock”.
The rising prices have increased pressure on the government of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba to do more to help consumers.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Netflix fared better than analysts anticipated during the first three months of the year, signaling the world’s largest video streaming service is still thriving as President Donald Trump’s policies cast a pall on the economy.
The numbers released Thursday indicated Netflix is still building on the momentum that enabled it to add 41 million worldwide subscribers last year — the biggest annual gain in the company’s 27-year history.
But it’s unclear precisely how many more subscribers Netflix picked up during the January-March period because this report marks the first time that the Los Gatos, California, company hasn’t provided a quarterly update on its total subscribers.
Netflix announced last year it would no longer report subscriber numbers beginning with this quarter as the company seeks to shift investors’ focus to its profits after topping 300 million global subscribers in December. As part of that emphasis Netflix is working to sell more advertising to supplement subscription dollars.
Netflix’s sharper focus on its finances paid off in this year’s first quarter with earnings of USD2.9 billion, or USD6.61 per share, a 24 per cent increase from the same time last year. Revenue climbed 13 per cent from the same time last year to USD10.54 billion. Both numbers exceeded forecasts compiled by FactSet Research. Without providing details, Netflix cited ongoing subscriber growth as the main reason for its strong start this year.
FILE- In this Nov. 4, 2017, file photo, the logo of entertainment company Netflix is pictured in Paris. PHOTO: AP
The robust growth occurred amid economic chaos and Trump’s fluctuating trade war. The tech industry has suffered greatly from the extensive tariffs that Trump announced on April 2, as numerous bellwether companies depend on international supply chains that have received some relief through temporary freezes and exemptions from the fees.
But Netflix’s global streaming service hasn’t been touched by Trump’s tariffs yet, making the company a notable exception that has enabled its stock price to increase 9 per cent so far this year, while the market values of most other major tech companies have plummeted.
The company’s shares rose nearly 3 per cent in extended trading after its report came out.
The trade war could still hurt Netflix if it triggers a recession or fuels inflationary pressures as many economists fear. In those scenarios, more consumers may curtail their discretionary spending on entertainment.
The economic volatility might lead to a reduction in advertising, negatively impacting Netflix’s efforts to sell more commercials for a low-priced version of its streaming service, which contributed significantly to its subscriber growth last year.
“We’re paying close attention clearly to the consumer sentiment and where the broader economy is moving,” Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said during a Thursday conference call. “But based on what we are seeing by actually operating the business right now, there’s nothing really significant to note.”
Peters also said Netflix’s low-cost option, currently priced at USD8 per month in the US, should help insulate its video streaming service if households start tightening their belts.
In a sign of its confidence, Netflix reaffirmed its previous prediction for annual revenue of roughly USD44 billion, up 13 per cent from 2024.
AFP – Manchester United Manager Ruben Amorim has invited Masters champion Rory McIlroy to Old Trafford to help inspire the struggling Red Devils.
United fan McIlroy completed golf’s career Grand Slam at Augusta National in dramatic fashion on Sunday with his first major win in 11 years. The Northern Irishman said he would take his green jacket to Old Trafford “if it can inspire some better play” from United, who sit 14th in the Premier League after a miserable season.
“Congratulations for the Masters and I want to invite you to Old Trafford to show your trophy,” Amorim said in a message on United’s social media accounts.
“It’s really important for us in this moment. You achieved something that a lot of people thought would be impossible and we want that feeling in our stadium.
MADRID (AFP) – Spanish police said they have uncovered an illegal underground firing range they suspect was operated by a weapons trafficking ring that supplied assault rifles and other arms to drug gangs.
Officers raided a house in the southern province of Granada and found the site, which was located three stories underground, said a police statement.
Neighbours could not hear guns going off because of the depth of the range, it added.
Police said it was the first time they had found a “illegal shooting range run by a criminal group” in Spain.
Authorities believe the site was used to test weapons that the group supplied to drug trafficking rings, who then used them to defend themselves or attack rival gangs.
“The operation has removed weapons from the streets that could have been used to commit extremely serious crimes,” the statement said.
Police said the group offered to sell assault rifles, submachine guns and automatic pistols, as well as ammunition, bulletproof vests and other tactical equipment.
Officers arrested three people and seized several weapons and more than EUR60,000 (USD68,000) in cash. They said further arrests were possible.
Spain is a major gateway to Europe for drug trafficking networks due to its ties to former colonies in Latin America.
THE HAGUE (AP) – After sending its most famous work to be featured in Amsterdam’s blockbuster 2023 exhibition of nearly every work by Johannes Vermeer, the Mauritshuis museum found itself with a blank space where the iconic Girl with a Pearl Earring had been
displayed.
The Hague-based institution turned to more than 2,700 artists, from Texas to Ukraine, from age seven to 70, who created their own interpretations of the 17th-Century masterpiece.
A selection of 60 works using materials ranging from orange peels to bottle caps to sweatshirts were exhibited in the museum while the painting was on loan 64 kilometres to the north.
“The submissions continue to come, it will never end with her,” director of the Mauritshuis museum Martine Gosselink told The Associated Press, pointing to the ongoing popularity of works featuring the mystery girl.
A 2020 investigation into the painting using a battery of modern imaging techniques uncovered details about Vermeer’s methods and the makeup of his pigments, but not the young woman’s identity.
ABOVE & BELOW: A video journalist takes photos of the ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ painting by Johannes Vermeer at The Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, Netherlands; and Rob de Heer talks next to his artwork. PHOTO: APPHOTO: AP
“I bring together the original The Girl with a Pearl and the face of a Wayang puppet,” artist Rob de Heer told the AP, standing in front of a screen in the museum’s foyer where all of the winning submissions are displayed.
De Heer, who primarily works with mixed media, wanted to take an image from the Golden Age history of the Netherlands and combine it with one evoking its colonial legacy. Wayang puppets are a traditional form of theatre in parts of Indonesia, which was ruled by the Netherlands until 1949.
His surrealist work is followed in the rolling display by a piece featuring the original girl’s face superimposed on an antique tea tin.
Other submissions include works by South Korean artist Nanan Kang, who used an ear of corn for the face; Georgian artist Nino Kavazauri, who reimagined a modern girl waiting at a bus stop with a cup of coffee; and Simon Chong, a Welsh animator, who works on the popular television series Bob’s Burgers and created a girl in the show’s cartoon style.
The winners were displayed in a replica frame in the exact spot where Girl with a Pearl Earring usually hangs, between two portraits by Dutch Baroque painter Gerard ter Borch.
The popularity of the first competition prompted a second round and those submissions are now on display at the Fabrique des Lumières in Amsterdam.
Gosselink, who has been the museum’s director since 2020, said the breadth and depth of the works made it difficult to select who would be featured in the exhibition.
“I would dare to say that some of the ones we selected are new pieces of art, and they would be served very well in a new surroundings, like a museum,” Gosselink said. – Molly Quell
JAKARTA (AP) – Indonesia plans to clear forests about the size of Belgium to produce sugarcane-derived bioethanol, rice and other food crops, potentially displacing Indigenous groups who rely on the land to survive.
Local communities say they’re already experiencing harm from the government-backed project, which environmental watchdogs say is the largest current planned deforestation operation in the world.
A vast tropical archipelago stretching across the equator, Indonesia is home to the world’s third-largest rainforest, home to many endangered species of wildlife and plants, including orangutans, elephants and giant forest flowers. Some live nowhere else.
Indonesia has been building food estates, massive plantations designed to improve the country’s food security for decades, with varying level of success. The concept was revived by former President Joko Widodo during his 2014- 2024 administration.
The current president, Prabowo Subianto, has expanded such projects to include crops to produce bioethanol, a renewable fuel made from plants like sugar cane or corn, in pursuit of Indonesia’s ambition to improve its energy mix and develop more renewable sources.
“I am confident that within four to five years at the latest, we will achieve food self-sufficiency,” Prabowo said in October 2024. “We must be self-sufficient in energy and we have the capacity to achieve this.”
Biofuels, such as bioethanol, play an important role in decarbonising transport by providing a low-carbon solution for sectors that heavily rely on fossil fuels such as trucking, shipping and aviation, according to the International Energy Agency. But the agency also cautions expansion of biofuel should have minimal impact on land-use, food and other environmental factors in order to be developed sustainably.
That’s of particular concern in Indonesia, where more than 74 million hectares of Indonesian rainforest – an area twice the size of Germany – have been logged, burned or degraded for development of palm oil, paper and rubber plantations, nickel mining and other commodities since 1950, according to Global Forest Watch.
ABOVE & BELOW: A man inspects a rice field at the site of an Indonesian government’s food estate project in Merauke, Papua province, Indonesia; and Papua’s Yei tribe people cut a sago tree to find sago grubs. PHOTO: APPHOTO: APPapuans hold posters during a protest. PHOTO: APHeavy machines operate to clear land at the site of Indonesian government’s food estate project to produce sugarcane-derived bioethanol, rice and other food crops. PHOTO: AP
Indonesia has vast potential for bioethanol production due to its extensive agricultural land but currently lacks sustainable feedstocks, like sugarcane and cassava. A previous attempt to introduce bioethanol-blended fuel in 2007 was discontinued a few years later due to a lack of feedstock supply.
Since then, the government has accelerated work on its food and energy estate mega-project, which spans 4.3 million hectares on the islands of Papua and Kalimantan. Experts say the combined size of the numerous project sites makes the mega-project the largest current deforestation project in the world.
The largest site, called the Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate, will cover more than three million hectares in the far-eastern region of Papua, according to the international environmental organisation Mighty Earth.
Overlapping with the Trans-Fly ecoregion, it’s home to critically endangered and endemic mammals, birds and turtles and to several Indigenous groups who rely on traditional ways of living.
“Imagine every piece of vegetation in that area being completely cleared … having all the trees and the wildlife erased from the landscape and replaced with a monoculture,” said chief executive officer of Mighty Earth Glenn Horowitz. “It’s creating a zone of death in one of the most vibrant spots on Earth.”
An unpublished government feasibility assessment obtained and reviewed by The Associated Press estimates that carbon dioxide emissions from clearing land for the project will total 315 million tonnes of C02 equivalent. An independent assessment by the Indonesia-based think tank Center of Economic and Law Studies estimated double that.
Deforestation contributes to erosion, damages biodiverse areas, threatens wildlife and humans who rely on the forest and intensifies disasters from extreme weather.
Hashim Djojohadikusumo, Subianto’s brother and envoy for energy and the environment, said the government will reforest 6.5 million hectares of degraded and deforested land.
“Thus, the food estate programme continues while we mitigate the possible negative impacts with new programmes, one of which is reforestation,” he said.
But experts warn that reforestation, while essential, cannot match the ecological benefits of old-growth ecosystems, which store vast amounts of carbon in their soils and biomass, regulate water cycles and support biodiversity.
Indonesia’s Ministry of Agriculture, which oversees the food and energy estate project, did not respond to requests for comment from the AP. Merauke Sugar Group and Jhonlin Group, the two main Indonesian companies in charge of the project in Merauke, did not respond to requests for comment from the AP.
Local communities in Papua that rely on the area for hunting, fishing and other aspects of their cultural identity say their basic needs have been harmed by the projects.
Vincen Kwipalo, 63, a villager living in the area, said that land he and other villagers used for hunting was turned into sugarcane nurseries guarded by groups of men, preventing them from engaging in their usual ways of surviving.
“We know the forests of Papua are one of the biggest lungs of the world, yet we are destroying it,” Kwipalo said. “Indonesia should be proud to protect Papua … not destroy it.”
Environmental watch groups say the projects’ development will impact generations of Indigenous groups for generations to come
“Where are they going to hunt, fish and live?” said Horowitz. “For an Indigenous community that’s relied on the rainforest to provide for centuries, are they supposed to live in a sugar plantation?”
PAKISTAN (AFP) – At the foot of Pakistan’s impossibly high mountains whitened by frost all year round, farmers grappling with a lack of water have created their own ice towers.
Warmer winters as a result of climate change has reduced the snow fall and subsequent seasonal snowmelt that feeds the valleys of Gilgit-Baltistan, a remote region home to K2, the world’s second-highest peak.
Farmers in the Skardu valley, at an altitude of up to 2,600 metres in the shadow of the Karakoram mountain range, searched online for help in how to irrigate their apple and apricot orchards.
They watched the videos of Sonam Wangchuk, an environmental activist and engineer in the Indian region of Ladakh, less than 200 kilometres away across a heavily patrolled border, who developed the technique about 10 years ago.
ABOVE & BELOW: Pakistan’s mountainous Gilgit-Baltistan region; and local residents ploughing in the cold region. PHOTO: AFPPHOTO: AFPAn artificial glacier built by local residents during winters to conserve water for the summers. PHOTO: AFP
Water is piped from streams into the village, and sprayed into the air during the freezing winter temperatures.
“The water must be propelled so that it freezes in the air when temperatures drop below zero, creating ice towers,” said a professor at the University of Baltistan Zakir Hussain Zakir, .
The ice forms in the shape of cones that resemble Buddhist stupas, and act as a storage system – steadily melting throughout spring when temperatures rise.
Gilgit-Baltistan has 13,000 glaciers – more than any other country on Earth outside the polar regions.
Their beauty has made the region one of the country’s top tourist destinations – towering peaks loom over the Old Silk Road, still visible from a highway transporting tourists between cherry orchards, glaciers and ice-blue lakes.
Specialist Sher Muhammad however said most of the region’s water supply comes from snow melt in spring, with a fraction from annual glacial melt in summers.
“From late October until early April, we were receiving heavy snowfall. But in the past few years, it’s quite dry,” researcher at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) Muhammad told AFP. “Faced with climate change, there are neither rich nor poor, neither urban nor rural; the whole world has become vulnerable,” said 24-year-old Yasir Parvi.
“In our village, with the ice stupas, we decided to take a chance.”
WASHINGTON (AP) – Early humans were regularly using animal bones to make cutting tools 1.5 million years ago.
A newly discovered cache of 27 carved and sharpened bones from elephants and hippos found in Tanzania’s Olduvai Gorge site pushes back the date for ancient bone tool use by around 1 million years. Researchers know that early people made simple tools from stones as early as 3.3 million years ago.
The new discovery reveals that ancient humans “had rather more complex tool kits than previously we thought,” incorporating a variety of materials, said paleoanthropologist at the American Museum of Natural History William Harcourt-Smith, who was not involved in the research.
The well-preserved bone tools, measuring up to around 40 centimetres, were likely made by breaking off the thick ends of leg bones and using a stone to knock off flakes from the remaining bone shaft.
This technique was used to create one sharpened edge and one pointed tip, said researcher at the Spanish National Research Council and study co-author Ignacio de la Torre. The bone tools were “probably used as a hand axe” – a handheld blade that’s not mounted on a stick – for butchering dead animals, he said.
Such a blade would be handy for removing meat from elephant and hippo carcasses, but not used as a spear or projectile point. “We don’t believe they were hunting these animals.
They were probably scavenging,” he said.Some of the artifacts show signs of having been struck to remove flakes more than a dozen times, revealing persistent craftsmanship.
The uniform selection of the bones – large and heavy leg bones from specific animals – and the consistent pattern of alteration makes it clear that early humans deliberately chose and carved these bones, said paleobiologist at the Federal University of Sao Carlos in Brazil Mírian Pacheco, who was not involved in the study. The bones show minimal signs of erosion, trampling or gnawing by other animals – ruling out the possibility that natural causes resulted in the tool shapes, she added. The bone tools date from more than a million years before our species, Homo sapiens, arose around 300,000 years ago.
The tools may have been made and used by Homo erectus, Homo habilis or Paranthropus boisei. “It could have been any of these three, but it’s almost impossible to know which one,” said Pobiner.
Conservator Ana Seisdedo holds a bone tool found in Tanzania’s Olduvai Gorge, at the CSIC-Pleistocene Archaeology Lab in Madrid. PHOTO: AP
WASHINGTON (AFP) – United States (US) President Donald Trump called Harvard a “joke” and said it should lose its government research contracts after the prestigious university refused demands that it accept outside political supervision.
Trump’s administration also threatened to ban the famed seat of learning from admitting foreign students unless it bows to the requirements, as US media reported that officials were considering revoking the university’s tax-exempt status.
“Harvard can no longer be considered even a decent place of learning, and should not be considered on any list of the World’s Great Universities or Colleges,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.
“Harvard is a joke, teaches hate and stupidity, and should no longer receive Federal Funds.”
Trump is furious at the storied institution for rejecting government supervision of its admissions, hiring practices and political slant and ordered the freezing of USD2.2 billion in federal funding to Harvard this week.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) also cancelled USD2.7 million worth of research grants to Harvard on Wednesday and threatened the university’s ability to enrol international students unless it turns over records on visa-holders’ “illegal and violent activities”.
“If Harvard cannot verify it is in full compliance with its reporting requirements, the university will lose the privilege of enrolling foreign students,” a DHS statement said, with Secretary Kristi Noem accusing the university of “bending the knee to antisemitism”.
International students made up 27.2 per cent of Harvard’s enrolment this academic year, according to its website.
Other institutions, including Columbia University, have bowed to less far-ranging demands from the Trump administration, which claims that the educational elite is too left-wing.
Harvard has flatly rejected the pressure, with its president, Alan Garber, saying that the university refuses to “negotiate over its independence or its constitutional rights”.
Trump also said that Harvard “should lose its Tax Exempt Status” as a non-profit educational institution if it does not back down. CNN and the Washington Post reported that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was now making plans to do so following a request from Trump.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Harrison Fields told AFP by e-mail that “any forthcoming actions by the IRS will be conducted independently of the President”.
Demonstrating the broadening resonance of the row, Golden State Warriors basketball coach Steve Kerr spoke out in support of Harvard.
Kerr, sporting a Harvard T-shirt, called the demands on the university the “dumbest thing I’ve ever heard” and cited his backing of “academic freedom”. The payments frozen to Harvard are for government contracts with its leading research programmes, mostly in the medical fields where the school’s laboratories are critical in the development of new medicines and treatments.
Trump and his White House team have publicly justified their campaign against universities as a reaction to what they say is uncontrolled anti-Semitism and a need to reverse diversity programmes aimed at encouraging minorities.
File photo shows visitors gathering around the statue of John Harvard in Harvard Yard at Harvard University, United States. PHOTO: AP
BOGOTA (AFP) – Colombia has declared a national health and economic emergency over a deadly yellow fever outbreak, with the government urging people to get vaccinated and take precautions while travelling over Easter weekend.
The mosquito-borne virus, which typically causes fever, muscle pains, nausea and headaches, is endemic to multiple countries in South America, including Colombia, where the current outbreak has had a high mortality rate.
At least 34 people have died among 74 confirmed cases since the start of the year, Minister of Health Guillermo Jaramillo told state-run Radio Nacional de Colombia.
“It’s a disease with a mortality rate of nearly 50 per cent among those infected,” he said while explaining the emergency decree.
The virus has also spread beyond the rural regions traditionally considered at risk for outbreaks, “making it a threat to more communities”, he said.
The most severe situation is in the coffee-growing Tolima area, where the number of detected yellow fever cases rose from four in September 2024 to 22 by mid-April, according to Jaramillo.
“We are going to require the carrying of the vaccination card for people entering or leaving Colombia,” he told the radio station.
Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro announced an economic emergency on top of the health decree, and called on citizens to get vaccinated.
“People who have not been vaccinated should not go to high-risk areas during Easter: for now the coffee area,” he wrote on Facebook. Petro blamed climate change for further spreading the virus by bringing the disease-carrying Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to higher altitudes.
On Tuesday, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) upgraded its yellow fever alert for South America to level two of four, noting “an increased number of cases of yellow fever have been reported in parts of South America”.
It advised travellers to consider getting vaccinated against yellow fever or receiving booster shots before visiting some areas of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru.
File photo shows the Rumichaca international bridge on the Ecuador-Colombia border. PHOTO: AFP
