A Petition to Japan government

Dear Policy Makers,

You are grappling with a steep debt-GDP ratio (which, if not for the public savings, would have taken the country down by now), global competitiveness and above all a drooping morale and a lack of ambition amongst your young. 

I would kindly like to bring to your attention one single greatest factor which you can directly control:

Alcohol Consumption!

Boozing is rampant in your country and drinking culture has seeped deep in the society. 

Office workers' most common routine is to have a drink or two before returning home. School goers (in addition to sneak binges) are eagerly waiting for the legal age of hatachi (20) before they can jump on the bandwagon too! 

Ladies are not lagging behind either and why should they, after all this is the age of no discrimination... 

In my stay of 4 years, I have met only three people who say they don't drink; one of them due to medical reasons.

*This graph is from www.nationmaster.com. Says the whole story!

(*per person per year)

And this is one country where liquor is most easily available. Lines of izakayas (local pubs) in every market, vending machines selling beer, wine shops, and most important, the 24hour convenient stores - all of which seem to be selling alcohol. 

Oh, and never in all these years have I seen any of them asking for ID!

You will say that spirits industries are one of the oldest, strongest and driving the economy too. It is a argument that with a revenue of ~USD14 Billion, Asahi Breweries donated ~USD 2.5 million to charity last spring and intends to distribute another amount this year to prefectures (government) according to "sales volumes". 

However, this is just the perfect incentive given to the government to not to intervene with growth and marketing plans.

In addition to the reasons of looking at a future with forward thinking and decent society, you have to control the sale and advertising of alcohol because:

1) A parent acts as a role model for her children. But when parents return home in a drunk state, how will the children look up to them?

2) The negative impact of regular drinking on health is well known. Research has also shown that drinking kills brain cells. Think of how much brain-power you are loosing as a nation.

A few generations down, children will have much lesser cognitive abilities (might even get significantly dumb)! Think who will drive your innovations, write haiku and shodou, and run the government then?

3) In spite of a strong alcohol lobby, other nations have maintained resistance to make it so widely and easily available. By buckling in to the pressure from lobbies of such industries you are losing a competitive edge globally. 

4) Spirits are proven to have a negative sexual effects, which impacts the birth rate too. So promoting alcohol is counterproductive to your policies to promote the birth rate.

For the people who want to quit, it is next to impossible to do so in Japan. You travel in the subways or watch TV - one in five (if not more, at least 10%) of the commercials are for alcoholic beverages (Asahi, Kirin, Sapporo, Suntory etc.). Even in prime-time, when many children are watching!
You go to office parties and will immediately feel out of place if you refuse a drink. 
You almost become a social outcast if not drinking!

So raising this petition for:

1) Restricting rampant advertising of alcohol in internet, mobile, print-media, TV, fliers and hoardings.
(Stop prime time advertisements of alcohol; Restrict other alcohol commercials to less than 5%; Aim for similar restrictions on alcohol industry as it is on tobacco industry)

2) Restricting sales channels to make it difficult to buy. At least from the convenient stores and vending machines.
(Stop alcohol sales in 24hr convenient stores; Make compulsory Taspo like card for purchasing alcohol)

Trust me, those who want to drink will find a way to their jokki and nama. But these measures will bring a gradual impact on the generations to come and you will slowly move towards a lesser drinking and more healthier society.

Else, it will be interesting to see the strength of the economy propping itself on the pillars of beer cans and wine bottles.

- A Concerned Resident