Why are there millions of empty houses in Japan? - The Global Story podcast, BBC World Service

Video Description

In Japan, the number of abandoned homes - known as Akiyas - is at an all-time high, with 9,000,000 million properties sitting empty on city streets and turning rural communities into ghost towns. Click here to subscribe to our channel 👉🏽 https://bbc.in/3VyyriM Lucy Hockings is joined by BBC Tokyo correspondent Shaimaa Khalil to ask why these abandoned homes are such a problem? What they say about Japan's existential population crisis? And whether there are any solutions? 00:00 Introduction 01:00 Spotting the abandoned homes 02:20 Dolls replace people in 'dying' village 02:55 Abandoned homes in cities 03:23 Why are there 9,000,000 empty homes in Japan? 04:06 Cultural and economic factors 05:22 'Homes die when the people die' 06:29 Impact on rural communities 07:00 Why not just knock the homes down? 07:47 Empty houses creating earthquake hazards 09:00 Foreigners buying and renovating these homes 10:53 Can tourism solve the empty home crisis? 12:42 Why foreigners are buying Akiyas 14:15 Japanese opinion on foreigners buying up empty houses 15:00 Does the Government have a plan for Akiyas 16:44 Japan's aging population problem 17:35 'Akiyas tell the story of Japan' Watch more episodes of The Global Story here 👉🏽 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLz_B0PFGIn4dvK8UQS79GwGLDl94Z3gkt You can listen to more episodes of The Global Story here. Making sense of the news with our experts around the world. Insights you can trust, Monday to Friday, from the BBC 👉🏽 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xtvsd/episodes/downloads ---------------- This is the official BBC World Service YouTube channel. If you like what we do, you can also find us here: Instagram 👉🏽 https://www.instagram.com/bbcworldservice Twitter 👉🏽 https://twitter.com/bbcworldservice Facebook 👉🏽 https://facebook.com/bbcworldservice BBC World Service website 👉🏽 https://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio Thanks for watching and subscribing! #BBCWorldService #WorldService #Japan #Akiyas #Housing