The “Japan Revitalization Strategy” (Revised in 2015) approved by the Cabinet in June 2015 set out “the goal of quickly preparing for an ‘era of 20 million’ foreign visitors coming to Japan, and its early realization”, and as a result of the promotion of various measures by the government aimed at the realization of a tourist-oriented country such as relaxation of visa requirements measures, since the number of foreign nationals entering Japan rapidly increased to approximately 19.69 million people in 2015, the “Tourism Vision to Support the Future of Japan” (decision of the Council for the Development of a Tourism Vision to Support the Future of Japan) outlined the goal of aiming for 40 million visitors by 2020, and 60 million visitors by 2030. The number of foreign nationals entering Japan in 2016 was about 23.22 million, an increase of 3.53 million (17.9%) compared to the previous year creating a new record.

Under such circumstances, an emergency increase was made in FY 2016 following on from the previous year, and in September 2016, in addition to Narita Airport, Kansai Airport and New Chitose Airport, 62 additional immigration inspectors were assigned to improve and reinforce the work of immigration examination pertaining to cruise ship passengers at some of the regional airports.

In FY 2017, in total, an additional 223 immigration inspectors were assigned to the immigration examinations at Narita Airport, Haneda Airport, Chubu Centrair Airport, Kansai Airport, New Chitose Airport, Fukuoka Airport and Naha Airport, which are the major airports in Japan, the secondary inspections in order to conduct strict and prompt landing examinations, and immigration examinations to handle the regional airports and the cruise ship passengers; as well as an additional 31 immigration control officers to improve and reinforce the work of the deportation procedures.

### 3. Training

As the number of foreign nationals entering and departing from Japan has been increasing year by year and the types of residence have diversified, the volume of services has increased and the contents of routine duties to be performed by immigration inspectors and immigration control officers have become more complicated and difficult. It is therefore indispensable to enhance the skills and abilities of the officers of the Immigration Bureau, and therefore we are now in the process of enriching and reinforcing our training program targeted for those officers.

In addition to systematic training for newly employed persons, middle-level persons and managers implemented by the Research and Training Institute of the Ministry of Justice, which is a training organization of the Ministry of Justice, the Immigration Bureau implements various kinds of training programs by not only staff with specialized knowledge but also outside experts are invited to give a lecture for the purpose of enhancing the professional knowledge of the staff, e.g. training for persons engaged in the detection of document forgery, training for persons engaged in entry and residence examination work, training for persons engaged in refugee recognition work, fingerprints examination training, and training for human rights and mental health.

Also, as the work of the Immigration Bureau is mainly concerned with foreign nationals, it makes efforts to improve language skills necessary for the work by organizing language seminars in English and other languages for staff at professional language schools, etc.