Japan Expo Encounters Ebb of Participating Countries The World Expo is an excellent platform for a country to showcase its soft power in contemporary culture, technology and industry to the world. As the host, when the national culture is paid attention to, interpreted and reported in depth by the world through the platform of the World Expo, there is a strong impetus for enhancing the popularity of the national culture and national pride.
The 2025 Osaka Kansai World Expo, which Japan is actively preparing for, is based on this purpose. Since the Heisei crisis, Japan has not had much of a presence in the 30 years it has lost. GDP has slipped from the previous second place in the world to the third place in the world, and there is a gap of nearly five times with the second place China, which is about to be surpassed by Germany.
In the traditional consumer electronics and high-end manufacturing fields, Japan's traditional advantages have disappeared, and it has basically been squeezed out of many fields such as mobile phones, home appliances, LCD panels, and shipbuilding. In the wave of technological innovation of mobile Internet and AI, the silent Japan lacks a sense of existence.
Therefore, with the help of international exhibitions such as the World Expo, it is a matter of great importance to Japan, to lift the spirit, show the new style of Japan, and enhance the popularity of Made in Japan in the world.
However, with the current execution capacity of Japan's manufacturing and construction industries, a major event that concerns the face of the country is about to fail miserably.
At present, Mexico, Estonia, and Russia have announced their withdrawal from the opportunity to participate in the Japan World Expo, some say that they lack money, and some do not even bother to make perfunctory gestures without giving any reason. Angola and Slovenia have given up on building their own pavilions. It is rumored on the Internet that Australia, New Zealand, India, Saudi Arabia and other important countries are also withdrawing from the Japan World Expo one after another, and the news has yet to be further confirmed.
How can an international feast of cultural, artistic and technological exchange scare the guests away?Behind this is the decline of Japan's manufacturing industry and the helplessness of the rigid system.
According to Japanese reports, the Osaka Kansai Expo, which is scheduled to open in 2025, was originally scheduled to be attended by more than 150 countries and regions. Among them, 60 countries plan to build their own pavilions, and about 100 countries and regions entrust Japan to build pavilions and participate in the exhibition by renting pavilions. There are a total of 25 new pavilions in Japan.
However, with only a year and a half left before the opening, only one country, the Czech Republic, has officially submitted an application to Japan for the construction of the national pavilion. Why is this happening?This is all related to the closed construction market in Japan, which means that in order to build venues in Japan, Japanese materials must be used, Japanese construction companies must be employed, and Japanese workers must be used.
It stands to reason that the construction of such a small project as the World Expo venue is a wise move to adapt measures to local conditions and save worry and trouble, but this is not the case at all in Japan.
In recent years, global inflation has been high, and Japan's construction industry, which is highly dependent on imports, has already had high prices, and it has taken off even more when it catches up with inflation. Japan's sharp price increases in materials, labor, transportation, etc., have greatly exceeded the budget of most exhibitors. The Japanese are notoriously rigorous and do not give exhibitors room to negotiate, and as a result, many exhibitors can't even find a construction contractor.
Another major challenge facing Japan** and exhibitors is the severe shortage of people in Japanese architecture. How much is missing?On the jobsite, there are more than twice as many employees over the age of 60 as there are young people under the age of 29. Young people in Japan are engaged in anime and cosplay, or they stay at home and play electricity, who wants to do all this hard work?
You say that Japan has Japan's special national conditions, and that the developed countries have high costs, and that the vast number of developing countries will find it difficult to adapt for the time being, but as a result, Japan will not be able to cope with this dilemma itself. Due to the tight time, heavy tasks, exquisite design, and labor-intensive construction of the World Expo venues, no large construction contractor was willing to undertake it, and as a result, Japan's "national pavilion" did not have a bidding unit, so it was forced to raise the budget by 900 million yen and directly signed a contract with Japan's Shimizu Construction Company. As you can imagine, other countries have struggled to build venues in Japan.
In view of the collapse of the Japanese construction industry, there is no room for rescue, so turn around and deal with the exhibitors.
In order to keep the Expo on schedule, the WBI began to lobby exhibitors to simplify their design schemes, to use more timber structures that can be built at any time, and to use more unreliable small and medium-sized construction companies. In order to improve efficiency, the Japanese side also came up with a "sao operation", that is, to prefabricate a box-shaped frame in advance, so that countries that have built their own "overseas pavilions" can decorate on this framework in DIY. The feedback it has received can be imagined.
The World Expo venue is a place that shows the unique art, culture and architectural technology characteristics of each country, and as a result, Japan's collapsed construction industry is ready to let various participating countries come to Japan to "build blocks" in the context of not being able to guarantee the normal construction of the World Expo, which is also one of the reasons why many countries are not enthusiastic about participating in the exhibition.
Of course, if Japan's nuclear sewage is discharged directly into the sea, threatening the health of all mankind, the 2025 World Expo in Osaka, Japan, is destined to end badly.