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July 09, 2026
 

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CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

Workers remove scaffolding mesh from a building at Sui Wo Court in Sha Tin, following authorities’ decision to remove the netting amid investigations into a deadly fire at Wang Fuk Court, in Hong Kong on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Dec 4, 2025
Hong Kong races to remove scaffolding nets blamed for fueling deadly fire
The government ordered their immediate removal from all public and private residential buildings, as authorities investigate the cause of the city’s deadliest fire in decades.
Police officers with the Disaster Victim Identification Unit work at the scene of last Wednesday's deadly fire at the Wang Fuk Court housing complex in Hong Kong on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Dec 2, 2025
Bamboo becomes identity issue for some in Hong Kong after blaze
Bamboo-clad buildings have long been a distinctive feature of the territory, which still relies on thousands of skilled workers who use them as scaffolding.
The aftermath of a fire that swept through the Wang Fuk Court apartment block, on Friday in Hong Kong.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 28, 2025
Hong Kong’s deadliest fire in decades followed a year of safety complaints
People living at Wang Fuk Court in northern Hong Kong had repeatedly raised concerns over fire hazards related to maintenance activity.
Smoke rises from buildings at a residential estate in Hong Kong on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC / ANALYSIS
Nov 28, 2025
Hong Kong fire poses test for China’s grip on the city
The fire struck as Hong Kong braces for the sentencing of media tycoon Jimmy Lai — the most prominent of hundreds of pro-democracy figures and activists facing lengthy jail terms.
A bystander looks on as fires continue to burn at the Wang Fuk Court residential estate in Tai Po district in Hong Kong on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 28, 2025
Inside Hong Kong’s ‘horrifying’ tower block blaze
The fire has left at least 94 dead and hundreds missing, and more than 70 have been hospitalized.
Firemen get ready after a major fire swept through several apartment blocks at the Wang Fuk Court residential estate in Hong Kong's Tai Po district on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 27, 2025
Hong Kong fire kills 55, hundreds missing as police cite ‘grossly negligent’ firm
Police said its cause could have been a “grossly negligent” construction firm using unsafe materials.
Six firms are suspected of rigging bids for construction work ordered by Tokyo’s transportation bureau to maintain railroad tracks.
BUSINESS / Companies
Nov 11, 2025
Tokyo transportation bureau and six firms inspected over alleged bid-rigging
The firms are suspected of rigging bids for construction work ordered by the bureau to maintain railroad tracks.
Mori Trust CEO Miwako Date speaks during an interview.
BUSINESS / Companies
Nov 5, 2025
Mori Trust CEO seeks foreign partners for condo hotels in Japan
The company wants to launch condos that can be rented out like hotel rooms, as it seeks to profit from the nation’s tourism boom.
Unisex restrooms with Western-style flush toilets are set to be introduced at construction sites operated by Daito Trust Construction.
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 15, 2025
Daito Trust to upgrade construction site toilets in gender diversity bid
The company is aiming to create a more comfortable sanitary environment amid a labor shortage and hoping to increase the female employment rate.
Hiroyuki Adachi, managing director of Shelter, a wooden architecture construction firm in Yamagata, speaks during a seminar in Sendai in July.
BUSINESS / Regional Voices: Tohoku
Sep 1, 2025
Wooden high-rise buildings increasing in Tohoku amid decarbonization trend
Major real estate developers and construction companies are focusing on wood, pushed by legislation and systems encouraging the use of domestically produced lumber.
General contractor Taisei aims to buy all Toyo Construction shares partly through a tender offer.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2025
General contractor Taisei to buy out Toyo Construction
Through the move, the two companies hope to expand their business and strengthen their earnings power while streamlining operations.
The total amount of unpaid costs for the construction of the German, Serbian and Romanian pavilions at the ongoing 2025 World Exposition are said to reach hundreds of millions of yen.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jun 20, 2025
Construction costs allegedly unpaid for three more expo pavilions
The total amount of unpaid costs for the German, Serbian and Romanian pavilions are said to reach hundreds of millions of yen.
Investigators inspect a construction site in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward on May 28 after an explosion occurred there a day earlier.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jun 2, 2025
Tokyo construction site blast caused by gas cylinder buried in the ground
The gas cylinder “may have been illegally dumped a long time ago” at the site, which was a paved parking lot for about 40 years.
A photo provided by a witness shows the scene of an explosion in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Society
May 27, 2025
Gas explosion injures 10 at Tokyo construction site, prompting evacuation
Police said workers had been driving piles into the ground for a new condominium when they likely struck an underground gas pipe, triggering the explosion.
Fukuoka Prefectural Police have arrested Ryuma Hanayama, the president of a civil engineering and construction company, on suspicion of abandoning the body of his father at a materials storage yard in Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
May 21, 2025
Company boss held on suspicion of abandoning father’s body at storage site
Ryuma Hanayama, 46, is suspected of burying the body of his 87-year-old father at a storage site owned by his company in the city of Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture.
China’s prolonged real estate slump has pushed housing construction back to early 2000s levels, sharply cutting cement production and offering a rare climate reprieve from one of the world’s biggest sources of carbon emissions.
COMMENTARY / World
May 21, 2025
China’s building crash is rewinding 22 years of growth
The real estate slump may be bad for the economy, but it’s good for the planet — cement is one of the most polluting substances on Earth.
Deceptive contractors prey on elderly homeowners and pressure them into signing contracts by making claims such as, "If you leave it unchanged, your house will tilt."
JAPAN / Crime & Legal / FOCUS
May 8, 2025
Japan struggles to crack down on home renovation scams
A senior police official said the rise in fraudulent renovation work is largely due to a legal loophole over small-scale construction work.
The buildings sector consumes 32% of the world's energy and contributes 34% of CO2 emissions.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Mar 18, 2025
‘More and faster’: U.N. calls to shrink buildings’ carbon footprint
CO2 emissions from the building sector rose around 5% in the last decade when they should have fallen 28%, according to a new report.
Police arrested Tsuyoshi Furusho, mayor of Saza, Nagasaki Prefecture, on Saturday in a bid-rigging case over a public works project in the town.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 9, 2025
Nagasaki town mayor arrested in bid-rigging case
Furusho, 77, was first elected mayor of the town in 2009. He is currently in his fourth term.
Construction workers in Pasadena, California, on Tuesday. The U.S. could lose millions of workers in the construction industry if President Donald Trump carries through on his campaign of mass deportations, with workers in agriculture, bars and restaurants also at risk.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Feb 12, 2025
Trump deportations send construction workers ‘back to the shadows’
Such a response could worsen a labor shortage that already threatens to delay homebuilding and exacerbate a housing affordability crisis.
Japan needs caregivers. Young Indians are answering the call.
Young people in India's northeast are increasingly studying Japanese in hopes of building new lives and careers in Japan.
Osaka trumps Tokyo as both ranked among world’s top 10 most livable cities
Osaka’s infrastructure earned higher marks than Tokyo’s in the Economist Intelligence Unit’s latest Global Liveability Index.
Japanese teen arrested for booting users off streaming service
The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department has arrested a 15-year-old boy for allegedly creating a malicious program and canceling subscription accounts on the Bandai Channel.
Japanese payment processor’s collapse hits banks and restaurants
Zentoshin served around 200,000 shops, many of which rely on early payments to maintain cash flow, raising concerns over their financial stability following the disruption.
Long-stalled maglev line finally gets green light from Shizuoka Prefecture
Environmental concerns relating to the construction of Central Japan Railway’s high-speed maglev line had contributed to years of delays for the project.
The beating heart inside ‘Human Vapor’
Different forms of love and connection form the emotional backbone of Netflix’s “Human Vapor,” says actor Shun Oguri, who plays troubled detective Kenji Okamoto.
Japan bets on character IP to drive global growth
Born on social media platforms in 2022, Opanchu Usagi has become a major hit, especially among Generation Z.
Filmmaker explores history of discrimination against foreign nationals in Japan
Takashi Nishihara, the director of "Now and Then," in Tokyo on Wednesday. The director has spent 10 years traversing politically charged terrain while exploring youth-driven grassroots political movements that scrutinize the status quo.
Okinawa’s prized seaweed under threat as oceans warm
Local harvesters gather <i>mozuku</i> during low tide at Hyakuna Beach in the city of Nanjo, Okinawa Prefecture. As the planet warms, rising ocean temperatures are placing increasing pressure on the seaweed industry.
Japanese nail salons are tourists’ new obsession
Tourists in Japan have always been interested in quintessentially Japanese approaches to modern culture, and, increasingly, visits to nail salons have become the new hot thing.

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