双语阅读｜重返福岛：任重而道远
FROM his desk, the mayor of Iitate, Norio Kanno, can see the beloved patchwork of forests, hills and rice paddies that he has governed for over two decades. A book in the lobby of his office calls it one of Japan’s most beautiful places, a centre of organic farming. The reality outside mocks that description. The fields are mostly bald, shorn of vegetation in a Herculean attempt to remove the radioactive fallout that settled six years ago. There is not a cow or farmer in sight. Tractors sit idle in the fields. The local schools are empty.
站在福岛县饭馆村村长菅野典雄(Norio Kanno)办公桌后，可以眺望到远处破败的森林，荒凉的群山和菅野种了20多年的稻田。菅野对这里的一草一木都怀有深深的感情。菅野办公室的休息厅里有一本书，书中称赞饭馆村是日本最美村落之一，还是日本有机农业的中心基地。外面的现实的情况却是对这些美好的描述形成莫大的讽刺。农田基本上一片荒凉，颗粒无收，人们付出巨大而艰难的努力，试图消除2011年福岛核事故释放的放射性沉降物。放眼望去，看不见一头牛或是农民，拖拉机闲置在田野里，当地学校也空无一人。
Iitate, a cluster of hamlets spread over 230 square kilometres, was hit by a quirk of the weather. After the accident at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, 45km (28 miles) away, which suffered meltdowns after a tsunami in 2011, wind carried radioactive particles that fell in rain and snow on a single night. Belatedly, the government ordered the evacuation of the 6,000 villagers. Now it says it is safe to return. With great fanfare, all but the still heavily contaminated south of Iitate—the hamlet of Nagadoro—was reopened on March 31st (see map).
饭馆村方圆230多公里，由许多小村落组成，遭遇了罕见的天气状况。福岛第一核电站距离该村约45公里，在2011年海啸后遭遇了严重的核泄漏事故。一夜之间，放射性颗粒夹杂在雨雪中随风四散。日本政府当即下令当地6000名村民紧急撤离，可已是为时已晚。如今，日本政府称福岛是安全的，居民们可以重返家园。在政府的大力呼吁下，3月31日，饭馆村南部曾受到严重核污染的长泥村允许人员进出。
The only part of the village that looks busy, however, is the home for the elderly. Locals say a few hundred people, at most, have returned, predominantly the retired. Mr Kanno will not reveal how many “because it gives the impression that we are forcing people to live here, which we don’t intend to do.” Yet many evacuees now face a stark choice: return to Iitate, or lose part of the compensation that has helped sustain them elsewhere.
然而，如果说饭馆村还有地方有人气的话，那就是老人们的家。当地人称，最多只有100来人回来了，绝大部分是退休老人。菅野村长不愿透露具体数字，“因为这会给我们一种‘逼着人们回来’的感觉，我们并无此意。”现在，许多疏散出去的人们都面临着两难的境地：要么重返饭馆村，要么放弃一部分能让他们在别处某生的赔偿金。
Last month this dilemma was expressed with unusual clarity by Masahiro Imamura, the minister in charge of reconstruction from the disaster. Pressed by a reporter, Mr Imamura said it was the evacuees’ “own responsibility, their own choice” whether or not to return. The comment touched a nerve. “It’s economic blackmail,” says Nobuyoshi Ito, a local farmer. Mr Imamura has since resigned.
4月，灾区重建负责人Masahiro Imamura对这一两难境地作出了非常明确的说明。在一位记者的逼问之下， Imamura表示，是否重返家园是疏散者“自己的选择，后果也是他们自己承担”。这番话触碰到很多人的痛处。“这简直就是经济勒索，”当地农民Nobuyoshi Ito说道。Imamura此后引咎辞职。
Nobody wants Fukushima mentioned in the same breath as Chernobyl. Almost three decades after the world’s worst nuclear accident, life there is still frozen in time, a snapshot of the mid-1980s Soviet Union, complete with posters of Lenin on school walls. By contrast, about ¥200m ($1.8m) per household has been spent decontaminating Iitate, helping to reduce radiation in many areas to well under 20 millisievert per year (the typical limit for nuclear-industry workers). But the clean-up extends to only 20 metres around each house, and most of the village is forested mountains. In windy weather, radioactive caesium is blown back onto the fields and homes.
没有人愿把福岛与切尔诺贝利相提并论。切尔诺贝利核电事故是世界上发生的最严重核泄漏事故，在三十年后，那里仍萧条而荒凉，可谓是上世纪80年代中期苏联的缩影——当时苏联学校的墙上到处张贴着列宁的画报。与此相反，福岛核事故发生后，日本政府每年支付约2亿日元(180万美元)用于净化饭馆村，努力将多地区的核辐射降低到20毫西弗以下(这是核工业工人的承受极限)。但是，清理工作的范围只能延伸到每栋房子周围20米，而且大部分村庄都地处森林覆盖的山区。在多风的天气里，放射性铯极易吹回田地和家里。
Nevertheless, Mr Kanno says it is time to cut monthly compensation payments which, in his view, encourage dependence. In 2012 Iitate’s became the first local authority in Fukushima prefecture to set a date for ending evacuation. The mayor pledged that year to revive the village in five years, a promise he has kept. A new sports ground, convenience store and noodle restaurant have opened. A clinic operates twice a week.
尽管如此，菅野认为应该削减每月的补偿金额，因为在他看来，补偿金会滋生依赖心理。2012年，饭馆村成为福岛县第一个设立结束撤离日期的地区。同时，村长承诺要在五年之内使饭馆村重焕生机。他也一直在为这一承诺不懈地努力。新的体育场地、便利店、面馆等相继开张。诊所也一周接诊两次。
All that is missing is people. Less than 30% of Iitate’s former residents want to return. (In Nagadoro, over half said they would never go back.) Many have used earlier lump-sum payments to build lives elsewhere. Before the disaster struck, the village had already lost a third of its population since 1970 as young folk moved to the cities—a process that has hollowed out many a furusato, or home town.
现在唯一缺少的就是人。愿意重返家园的饭馆村原居民还不到三成。（在长泥地区，超过半数的居民表示永远也不愿意回去）。许多人早已远走他乡，用当初政府一次性发放的赔偿金开始重建生活。在核泄漏事故发生之前，饭馆村从20世纪70年代开始就已陆陆续续流失了约三分之一的人口，因为年轻人不断地往城里搬迁，逐渐使故乡变成一个空壳。
Families left behind quarrel about whether to leave or stay, says Yoshitomo Shigihara, a villager. “Some try to feel out whether others are receiving benefits, what they are getting or how much they have received in compensation. It’s very stressful to talk to anyone in Iitate.” Some wanted to move the entire village to one of the country’s many depopulated areas but Mr Kanno would not hear of it. In trying to save the village, says Mr Ito, the mayor may be destroying it for good.
村民Yoshitomo Shigihara称，即使是留下来的人家也受去留问题的困扰。“有的人旁敲侧击试图打探到其他人是否得到了好处，他们现在过得怎样，或者得了多少补偿。在饭馆村无论和谁聊上几句都能感受到气氛的压抑。”有的人希望整个村子都搬到日本某个人烟稀少的地方，但是，菅野却没听说哪里有这么合适的地方。Ito认为，在努力拯救饭馆村的同时，村长可能也在彻底地毁掉它。
编译：张玺元
编辑：翻吧君
英文来源：经济学人