Japan Enacts Bill to Modernize Commercial Code Text

May 18, 2018

Tokyo- Japan's parliament enacted Friday a bill to fully convert the text of the country's commercial code into a colloquial style from the current classical literary format.

The bill was approved unanimously at a plenary meeting of the House of Councillors, the upper chamber. It passed the House of Representatives, the lower chamber, last month.

The revised commercial code will go into effect within one year after its promulgation.

The effectuation will mark the completion of the government's efforts to make the text of all of the country's six basic codes colloquial.

The commercial code was established in 1899. Its text was partially converted into colloquial Japanese, but about 230 of some 300 articles of the law were still written in the old style.

The constitution, which entered into force in 1947, is in a colloquial style from the beginning. The penal and civil codes were converted into colloquial Japanese in 1995 and 2005, respectively.

In addition to the conversion, the revised commercial code newly obliges cargo owners to notify shipping companies if they ask for deliveries of dangerous articles, such as chemical agents.

Furthermore, the maximum period during which cargo owners can lodge compensation claims against shipping companies over cargo damages will be shortened from the current five years to a global standard of one year. Jiji Press