A NOT SO WELCOME WELCOME

ASEE Prism, Feb 2004

TOKYO - Like the United States and Europe, Japan is feeling the strain of an aging society and lower fertility rates. Unlike the West, however, Japan has firmly resisted immigration throughout most of its modern history. Non-Japanese workers account for only 1 percent of the population, about one million people. One of the reasons Japan has been able to postpone the inevitable, says Kyushu Sangyo University's Atsushi Konclo, is "Japan had succeeded in improving manufacturing techniques through microcelectronics, robots, and automation, and as a result, less demand arose" for imported labor.

But biology has finally overwhelmed even Japanese technology: Japan's population is on course to start shrinking in 2007. The United Nations estimates Japan will need a whopping 600,000 foreign immigrants annually to replace lost workers and maintain economic growth.

Hidenori Sakanaka, director-general of the Tokyo Regional Immigration Bureau, says opinion in Japan has split into opposing camps. Xénophobes favor keeping the drawbridge firmly raised no matter what the cost, but Sakanaka and other progressives are urging drastic immigration reform.

Japan for years has tried to replicate the Silicon Valley phenomenon, but forum panelist Yasuyuki Motoyama said more attention should be paid to what made California so attractive a proposition for the world's high-tech brains. Among the biggest turnoffs for sought-after IT engineers are a lack of international schools, English-speaking doctors, and other services geared to non-Japanese speakers.