{"id":60832,"date":"2023-12-31T03:00:39","date_gmt":"2023-12-30T18:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2023\/dec\/30\/how-can-such-a-tiny-woman-drive-a-big-truck-japans-labour-shortage-forces-it-to-rethink-gender-stereotypes"},"modified":"2023-12-31T03:00:39","modified_gmt":"2023-12-30T18:00:39","slug":"how-can-such-a-tiny-woman-drive-a-big-truck-japans-labour-shortage-forces-it-to-rethink-gender-stereotypes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=60832","title":{"rendered":"\u2018How can such a tiny woman drive a big truck?\u2019 Japan\u2019s labour shortage forces it to rethink gender stereotypes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Freight and logistics sector is turning to women to fill gap as demand for drivers grows alongside cap on overtime<\/p>\n<p>When Mayumi Watanabe tells people what she does for a living, most struggle to hide their surprise, and not just because of her diminutive stature. As a truck driver with 23 years behind the wheel, she is one of a small but growing number of women coming to the rescue of an industry that is the beating heart of Japan\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI can see they\u2019re thinking, \u2018How can such a tiny woman drive a big truck?\u2019\u2009\u201d Watanabe, who is 152cm (5ft) tall, told the <em>Observer<\/em> as she prepared for the busy run-up to the end of the year. \u201cBut I\u2019ve always loved cars, so it felt natural to want to be a truck driver.\u201d<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2023\/dec\/30\/how-can-such-a-tiny-woman-drive-a-big-truck-japans-labour-shortage-forces-it-to-rethink-gender-stereotypes\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Freight and logistics sector is turning to women to fill gap as demand for drivers grows alongside cap on overtimeWhen Mayumi Watanabe tells people what she does for a living, most struggle to hide their surprise, and not just because of her diminutive&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":151,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,6,587,437,88,2122,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60832","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-business","category-economic-policy","category-economics","category-japan","category-transport-policy","category-world-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/151"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=60832"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60832\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60833,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60832\/revisions\/60833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=60832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}