# **V. Limitation of the Existing Literature and the** **_Brazil Nikkei Household Survey_**

This paper has presented a descriptive account of the migration of _Nikkeijin_ to Japan based on the available data and existing studies. While some data on the _Nikkei_ migrants and remittances sent to Brazil are available, most of the data are available only at the aggregate level, not at the household level, and there seems to be some discrepancy even among the existing data as noted earlier. A more serious problem is, however, the absence of microeconomic data at the household-level for the Japan-Brazil corridor, which would allow us to empirically analyze the migration and remittance behavior of _Nikkeijin_ and examine their welfare implications. In order to fill this gap, the World Bank Research Group is conducting the _Brazil Nikkei Household Survey_ among the Japanese community in Brazil at the time of writing the present paper.

The primary objective of this survey is to ascertain key determinants and constraints of migration by _Nikkeijin_ to, settlement in, and return from Japan. The survey also aims to examine the socioeconomic and welfare impacts of migration and remittances on _Nikkei_ households. The survey contains usual questions included in household surveys such as those on demographic composition of households, education level and economic activities of household members, information on housing conditions and ownership of durable goods. In addition, it incorporates migration-related questions specific to each group of respondents, namely households with returned migrants, those with current migrants, and those which do not have any household member who ever migrated to Japan. The survey, for instance, asks the main reasons for migrating to Japan (or for not migrating to Japan), the economic activity in Brazil before migrating (and after returning to Brazil for returned migrants) as well as in Japan, the duration of stay in Japan, the types of visa obtained upon arrival (and upon departure), whether the migrants had any network (i.e., friends, families or other acquaintances) in Japan, and the frequency and method of contact with the other household members left in Brazil.

The survey also contains questions regarding remittances. For instance, it asks households whether they receive any remittances from Japan, and if they do so, how they receive and how they spend them. It also asks about each household’s general accessibility to and use of financial services. If the household has any returned or current migrant, the survey asks which method he/she uses/used for remitting money to Brazil, and what factors affected the choice of the method used.

Another non-trivial contribution of this survey will be the assessment of different survey sampling methodologies to collect representative data through household survey questionnaires for applied microeconomic analysis of migration and remittance corridors.<sup>7</sup> The survey will firstly implement a “random stratified sampling frame” based on the available census data. It will then implement two alternative

> 7 See McKenzie and Mistiaen (2007) for more detailed discussion on the experiment of different sampling methodologies.

22