metadata: authors: 0: author: Goto,Junichi
count: Latin America,Japan,Brazil
docna: 0: docna: Latin Americans of Japanese origin
            (Nikkeijin) working in Japan : a survey
docty: Policy Research Working Paper
subtopic: Human Migrations & Resettlements,Educational Sciences,Employment and Unemployment,International Migration,Migration and Development,Armed Conflict
teratopic: Social Development,Health, Nutrition and Population,Social Protections and Labor,Communities and Human Settlements
abstracts: cdata!: Since the revision of the Japanese
            immigration law in 1990, there has been a dramatic influx of
            Latin Americans, mostly Brazilians, of Japanese origin
            (Nikkeijin) working in Japan. This is because the revision
            has basically allowed Nikkeijin to enter Japan legally even
            as unskilled workers, while the Japanese law, in principle,
            prohibits foreigners from taking unskilled jobs in the
            country. In response, the number of these Latin American
            migrants has increased from practically zero to more than
            250,000. The migration of Nikkeijin is likely to have a
            significant impact on both the Brazilian and the Japanese
            economies, given the substantial amount of remittances they
            send to Brazil. The impact is likely to be felt especially
            in the Nikkeijin community in Brazil. In spite of their
            importance, the detailed characteristics of Nikkei migrants
            and the prospect for future migration and remittances are
            under-researched. The purpose of this paper is therefore to
            provide a more comprehensive account of the migration of
            Nikkeijin workers to Japan. The paper contains a brief
            review of the history of Japanese emigration to Latin
            America (mostly Brazil), a study of the characteristics of
            Nikkeijin workers in Japan and their current living
            conditions, and a discussion on trends and issues regarding
            immigration in Japan and migration policy. The final part of
            the paper briefly notes the limitation of existing studies
            and describes the Brazil Nikkei Household Survey, which is
            being conducted by the World Bank's Development
            Research Group at the time of writing this paper. The
            availability of the survey data will contribute to a better
            understanding of the Japan-Brazil migration and remittance corridor.
geo_reg_key: 119228,517198,119225,517191
repnme: repnme: Latin Americans of Japanese origin
            (Nikkeijin) working in Japan : a survey
display_title: Latin Americans of Japanese origin
            (Nikkeijin) working in Japan : a survey
listing_relative_url: /research/2007/04/7595132/latin-americans-japanese-origin-nikkeijin-working-japan-survey
topicv3: Education m1327048 470,Political Violence and War m1327310 2462,Migrant Workers m1504032 2729,Immigration m1504162 2837,Emigration m1504169 2844
publishtoextweb_dt: 2010-07-01T00:00:00Z
historic_topic: Social Development,Health, Nutrition and Population,Social Protections and Labor,Communities and Human Settlements
no_of_pages: 51
author_keys: 0: author_key: 451281
model_extractions: WPS4203

# **Latin Americans of Japanese Origin (** **_Nikkeijin_ )**

# **Working in Japan – A Survey**

## **Junichi Goto**

## **Kobe University**

**Research Institute for Economics and Business Administration Kobe University Rokkodai-cho Nada-ku, Kobe 657-8501, Japan (phone) 81-70-803-7000 (fax) 81-78-803-7059 - (e-mail) jgoto@rieb.kobe** **<u>u.ac.jp</u>**

### World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 4203, April 2007

_The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the view of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent. Policy Research Working Papers are available online at http://econ.worldbank.org._
# **Abstract**

Since the revision of the Japanese immigration law in 1990, there has been a dramatic influx of Latin Americans, mostly Brazilians, of Japanese origin ( _Nikkeijin_ ) working in Japan. This is mainly because the revision has basically allowed _Nikkeijin_ to enter Japan legally even as unskilled workers, while the Japanese law, in principle, prohibits foreigners from taking unskilled jobs in the country. In response, the number of these Latin American migrants has increased from practically zero to more than 250,000. The migration of _Nikkeijin_ is likely to have a significant impact on both the Brazilian and the Japanese economies, given the substantial amount of remittances they send to Brazil. The impact is likely to be felt especially in the _Nikkeijin_ community in Brazil.

In spite of their importance, the detailed characteristics of _Nikkei_ migrants and the prospect for future migration and remittances are under-researched. The major purpose of this paper is therefore to provide a more comprehensive account of the migration of _Nikkeijin_ workers to Japan. The paper contains a brief review of the history of Japanese emigration to Latin America (mostly Brazil), a study of the characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan and their current living conditions, and a discussion on trends and issues regarding immigration in Japan and migration policy. The final part of the paper briefly notes the limitation of existing studies and describes the _Brazil Nikkei Household Survey_ , which is being conducted by the World Bank Research Group at the time of writing this paper. The availability of the survey data will certainly contribute to a better understanding of the Japan-Brazil migration and remittance corridor.

2
# **Table of Contents**

I. Introduction ...................................................................................... 4 II. History of Japanese Emigration to Brazil................................................... 5

- (1) Overview

- (2) Prologue (before 1908)

- (3) Period 1 (1908-1924): Immigration by Private Initiatives

- (4) Period 2 (1925-1936): Government-sponsored Immigration

- (5) Period 3 (1937-1951): Immigration Stricken by the War and its Aftermath

- (6) Period 4 (1952-1987): Post-war Immigration

III. Government Policy toward Migrant Workers in Japan................................. 11

1. Recent Trend in Number of Migrant Workers in Japan

2. Basic Principles of the Japanese Immigration Policy 3. Three Categories of Migrant Workers in Japan

- (1) Legal Skilled Workers

- (2) Illegal Unskilled Workers

- (3) Legal Unskilled Workers—Migrant Workers of Japanese Origin ( _Nikkeijin_ )

4. Reasons for the Sharp Increase—Push and Pull IV. _Nikkeijin_ Workers in Japan and the Japanese Government Policy towards Them... 15

1. Dramatic Increase Since the Beginning of the 1990s

2. _Nikkeijin_ Workers in the Early 1990s—Single Males in Car Parts Factory 3. _Nikkeijin_ Workers in Recent Years—Settlers with Family

- (1) From Temporary Guest Workers to Settlers

- (2) Clustered Cities

- (3) Problems with Education, and Crime

- (4) Policies of the Japanese Government towards _Nikkeijin_ in Japan

- (5) Remittances

V. Limitation of the Existing Literature and the Brazil Nikkei Household Survey....... 22

|VI. Concluding Remarks........................................................................ 23|
|---|
|Bibliography....................................................................................... 25|
|Tables and Figures................................................................................ 26|
|Appendix I: Chronology of the Japanese Emigration....................................... 48|
|Appendix II: Methodology of the Surveys Cited in the Paper.............................. 51|

3
# **I. Introduction**

Since the revision of the Japanese immigration law in 1990, there has been a dramatic influx of Latin Americans, mostly Brazilians, of Japanese origin ( _Nikkeijin_ ) working in Japan. This is mainly because the revision has basically allowed _Nikkeijin_ to enter Japan legally even as unskilled workers, while the Japanese law, in principle, prohibits foreigners from taking unskilled jobs in the country. In response, the number of these Latin American migrants has increased from practically zero to more than a quarter of million. According to the statistics provided by the Japanese Ministry of Justice, the number of Brazilians staying in Japan increased from about 4,000 in 1988 to 268,332 in 2002. In 2005 the number further increased to 302,080. The migration of _Nikkeijin_ is likely to have a significant impact on both the Brazilian and Japanese economies, given the substantial amount of remittances they send to Brazil. The impact is likely to be felt especially in the _Nikkeijin_ community in Brazil. While the number of _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil is estimated to be a little less than two million, about a quarter of million _Nikkeijin_ migrant workers from Brazil are currently in Japan. In other words, about one in every eight _Nikkeijin_ s in Brazil is living in Japan. Given the high rate of return/circular migration, practically every _Nikkeijin_ household has one member of the household with some working experience in Japan.

In spite of their importance, the detailed characteristics of _Nikkei_ migrants and the prospect for future migration and remittances are under-researched. The major purpose of the present paper is therefore to examine the migration and remittance issues as well as their policy implications pertaining to _Nikkeijin_ working in Japan. Although the main focus of the paper is placed on _Nikkeijin_ workers, some discussions of migrant workers in general and the government policies towards foreign workers are also included since these issues are not widely known to non-Japanese.

The paper is organized as follows. The next section examines the history of Japanese emigration to Latin America (mostly Brazil). This section is indispensable for understanding the characteristics of return migration of _Nikkeijin_ to Japan. Section III discusses general trends and issues regarding immigration in Japan. Section IV, the core section of this paper, describes the major characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan including the place of their residence, the types of their work, the duration of their stay, and the difficulties these _Nikkeijin_ migrants face. The section also draws attention to the present situation and future prospect of remittances to their home countries. In addition, the section reviews policies of the central and local governments towards _Nikkeijin_ workers. Given that the number of _Nikkeijin_ workers has dramatically increased and they tend to be clustered in several cities (e.g. Hamamatsu, Toyota, Toyohashi, and Oizumi), the social and economic impacts of _Nikkeijin_ workers on these cities are likely to be substantial. In response, governments as well as NGOs are making various efforts to create harmonious living of _Nikkeijin_ workers within Japanese communities. Finally, Section V briefly notes the limitation of existing studies and describes the _Brazil Nikkei Household Survey_ , which is being conducted by the World Bank Research Group at the time of writing this paper. The availability of the survey data will certainly contribute to
a better understanding of the Japan-Brazil migration and remittance corridor. Section VI summarizes the findings of the study, and discusses agendas for future studies.

# **II. History of Japanese Emigration to Brazil**

# **(1) Overview**

Before discussing _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan, let us examine the history of Japanese emigration to Latin America. In view of the fact that 85 percent of _Nikkeijin_ workers from Latin America to Japan are Brazilians (see Section IV for more details), this section focuses primarily on Japanese emigration to Brazil. As the chronology of the Japanese emigration in the Appendix I shows, this migration began in 1908, when the ship named Kasado-Maru, carrying 791 Japanese bonded workers ( _colonos_ ), arrived in the port of Santos. They were initially employed as bonded workers in coffee plantations. They gradually began to be engaged in various activities in Brazil including cultivation of various crops (other than coffee), commerce, and education. The current number of _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil is estimated to be close to two million as indicated in Table 1.

The 100 years of Japanese emigration to Brazil may be divided into five periods as follows: Period 1 (1908-1924): Immigration by private initiatives Period 2 (1925-1936): Government sponsored immigration Period 3 (1937-1951): Immigration stricken by the War and its aftermath Period 4 (1952-1987): Post-war immigration Period 5 (1988- to present): Return migration to Japan ( _Dekasegi_ ) This section will briefly discuss Periods 1 to 4, and the detailed discussion of Period 5 will be made in Section IV below.

# **(2) Prologue (before 1908)**

The government of Japan in Tokugawa era (i.e., Samurai era) had closed the country in 1639 fearing the spread of Christianity. Since then Japan had very limited contact with the outside world for more than 200 years until American Commodore Perry came to Uraga City and forced Japan to open the country in 1853. Japanese emigration began in 1868 (the first year of Meiji era), when about 500 Japanese immigrants arrived in Hawaii (and 40 in Guam). In 1869 about 40 Japanese immigrants arrived in California. Because of the maltreatment of the Japanese migrants in the destination countries, the Japanese government became reluctant to encourage emigration. However, in the 1880s the attitude of the Government changed due to the country’s stagnant economy. In order to mitigate unemployment problems, the Japanese government finalized official migration agreement with the Government of Hawaii in 1885. In that year, the first official Japanese immigrants – 943 of them – arrived in Hawaii. Between 1885 and 5
1894, many “official” Japanese immigrants were sent to different destinations including Hawaii, the mainland of the United States, Australia, New Caledonia, and Fiji.

In 1894, “Migration Protection Regulation (Imin Hogo Kisoku)” was issued by the Japanese government, which assigned private migration companies to recruit and arrange Japanese emigration. Since then several migration companies took an initiative to send Japanese immigrants to all over the world. While major destinations of these immigrants were Hawaii and the United States, they were also sent to other parts of the world. For example, 790 Japanese bonded workers arrived in Peru in 1899, and about 3,000 Japanese bonded workers were sent to the Philippines in 1903. The United States and Canada, however, began to restrict Japanese immigration. In 1907 the Japan-U.S. Gentlemen’s Agreement was signed, which severely restricted Japanese immigration to the United States including Hawaii that was annexed to the United States in 1898. In 1908 a similar gentlemen’s agreement was concluded between Japan and Canada. As a result, the immigration to North America became extremely restricted, and the migration companies had to look for new destinations, mainly in Latin America. Table 2 shows the number of Japanese immigrants to Latin America between 1899 and 1941 (the year when Japan-U.S. Pacific War broke out). More than a quarter of million Japanese migrated to Latin America and Brazil was by far the main destination with more than 200,000 (78.43%) Japanese immigrants (De Carvalho, 2003). Peru followed Brazil and received about 33,000 Japanese migrants. Brazil was also the single most important destination after World War II. More than 60 percent of Japanese emigrants to Latin America headed for Brazil.

The desire of Japanese migration companies to shift Japanese emigration from North America to South America coincided with an increase in the demand for labor in Brazil. The major sources of labor for coffee plantations in Brazil used to be slaves brought from Africa. However, the slavery was abolished in Brazil in 1888. Due to the labor shortage caused by the emancipation, the owners of coffee plantations began to accept immigrants from Europe, mainly from Italy and Spain at first. Nevertheless, the shortage of labor was not overcome by the European immigration alone. Therefore, the owners of coffee plantations started to explore other sources of labor supply. This development coincided with the need of Japanese migration companies to look for destinations other than North America for Japanese migrants. Consequently, the agreement between a Japanese migration company and the government of São Paulo was signed in 1907.

# **(3) Period 1 (1908-1924): Immigration by Private Initiatives**

On April 28, 1908, the Kasado-Maru left the port of Kobe for Brazil. The ship carried 781 Japanese emigrants who all expected to become wealthy in a few years in Brazil and to return to Japan in triumph. In order to enhance the recruitment of Japanese emigrants to Brazil, Kokoku Shokumin Kaisha (Imperial Migration Company), a private migration company, issued a deceiving advertisement. According to the advertisement, coffee was “a tree of gold”, and each family of Japanese migrants in 6
Brazil could save 40 yen a month (at that time a monthly salary of a young teacher in the elementary school was 10-13 yen). This advertisement was sanctioned by the Japanese Police and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

While the Japanese migrants dreamed of the tree of gold, the owners of coffee plantations simply wanted cheap labor. The Japanese migrants thus faced disappointment: their actual income was far less than advertised (just a subsistence level) and their working conditions were harsh. Although the Japanese immigrants dreamed of returning home after making a fortune in a few years, it remained just a dream. Of the 200,000 Japanese migrants who had migrated to Brazil before World War II, only seven percent actually returned to Japan (Takahashi, 1993). The majority of them thus remained in Brazil without knowing when (or if) they would make enough money to return home.

Despite the hardship of the Japanese immigrants in Brazil, the migration wave to Brazil continued, partly because the Government of São Paulo and the owners of coffee plantation gave travel subsidies to Japanese migrants. Table 3 shows the number of Japanese emigrants to Brazil since 1908. As the table indicates, the number of Japanese immigrants to Brazil surged in the 1910s. In most years, the number reached several thousands per year. In 1914 the total (accumulated) number of Japanese immigrants to Brazil exceeded ten thousands.

Almost all of the Japanese immigrants to Brazil in early years were bonded workers called “colonos.” These colonos were obliged to stay at their original plantations for a few years under the contract. Nevertheless, due to the low wages and harsh working conditions, most of them left the plantation before their contracted term was over. Some of them just ran away under the cloak of night, while others made an agreement with the plantation owners to move away to other plantations. After leaving their original plantations, these migrants had to find other jobs for living, which can be classified into three broad categories: (i) working in coffee and cotton plantations owned by relatively well-off Japanese; (ii) engaging in rice cultivation in the Rio Grande delta area; and (iii) moving to cities like São Paulo and working as domestic help etc. As early as 1909 (just one year after Kasado-Maru arrived in São Paulo) five Japanese families owned land in Brazil and had started the cultivation of cotton. In 1915 several Japanese plantations called “colonies” were opened, the most famous of which was Hirano Colony Plantation. Table 4 shows the crop share of _Nikkeijin_ farmers in Brazil since 1912. As this table reveals, in 1912 more than 90 percent of Japanese farmers were engaged in coffee production. However, 10 years later (in 1922), the share of farmers engaged in coffee production dropped to half, whereas the shares of rice, cotton, and suburb farming (e.g. vegetables, eggs, and chicken) increased substantially.

The Japanese migrants realized that it was extremely difficult for them to become rich and to return home quickly. Hence they began to form infrastructure in the _Nikkeijin_ communities. As they never gave up the idea of returning home some day, they put a particular emphasis on the Japanese language education for their children. In 1915 the 7
first Japanese language school opened in São Paulo (Taisho School). Since then the number of Japanese language schools increased rapidly. In 1932 the number of Japanese schools in São Paulo alone was close to 200, with more than 10,000 _Nikkeijin_ children being enrolled. In 1916 the first Japanese-language newspaper was published. In those years, _Nikkeijin_ lived within _Nikkeijin_ communities without assimilating into Brazilian communities. In many cases they did not speak Portuguese, and inter-marriages were rare.

# **(4) Period 2 (1925-1936): Government-sponsored Immigration**

As mentioned above, in early years the São Paulo Government and the owners of plantations gave Japanese immigrants travel subsidies hoping that those Japanese immigrants would provide cheap labor for coffee plantations. However, since the Japanese immigrants did not stay in the original coffee plantations, the government of São Paulo announced the termination of travel subsidies to Japanese immigrants in 1921. In response, the Japanese government decided in 1925 to provide travel subsidies to Japanese emigrants who wanted to go to Brazil. This was the beginning of the era of government-sponsored migration to Latin America. In addition to travel subsidies, in 1926 the Japanese government loaned a large amount of money (80,000 yen), with very low interest rates, to Japanese coffee farmers in Brazil, who were suffering from the plunge of world coffee price. In 1927, “Overseas Immigration Union Law (Kaigai Iju Kumiai Ho)” was enacted in Japan. The purpose of the law was to promote Japanese colony plantations all over the world, except in the United States and Canada. The United States and Canada adopted very strict policies against Japanese immigration. For example, in 1924, the United States enacted the law, which completely prohibited new immigration from Japan. In 1928, Canada took a similar measure to severely restrict Japanese immigration to the country. In 1928, the Ministry of Immigration (Takumu Sho) was created in the Japanese government with the mission to promote and direct Japanese emigration overseas (except for the United States and Canada destinations).

Due to the emigration promotion policies by the Japanese government and the shift from the United States and Canada, the flow of Japanese immigration to Brazil greatly increased in those years. As Table 3 shows, the number of Japanese annual emigration to Brazil more than doubled in 1925. The high rate of immigration continued until the mid-1930s. During the period, the average number of Japanese emigration to Brazil exceeded 10,000 per year.

In the 1930s, the Japanese imperialism, backed by the military force, became prevalent, and the Japanese invasion to China was intensified. In 1931 the Manchurian Incident, i.e., the war between Japan and China, broke out. In 1932 Manchuria became an “independent state”, which was a puppet regime of the Japanese military force. Since then the flood of Japanese immigration to Manchuria continued until the end of World War II (in 1945). In the same year, the Japanese government greatly increased travel subsidies given to the Japanese migrants traveling to Brazil in order to boost the immigration to Brazil. As a result, more than 20,000 Japanese arrived in Brazil in 1933 8
# (and also in 1934).

The military advance of Japan put _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil into a difficult situation. Since Brazil was a close ally of the United States, the country discouraged the inflow of immigrants from Japan, Germany, and Italy. In 1934 the famous “two percent clause” was added to the Brazilian Constitution, which limited the number of annual inflow of immigrants from each country to two percent of the total immigration from that country in the previous 50 years. Since Japanese immigration had a short history (started in 1908), the two percent clause meant a drastic decline of Japanese immigration to Brazil.

In 1936 the Japanese militarism further intensified due to the “2.26 incident.” On February 26, about 1,400 military personnel attempted a coup d’etat in Japan. Many politicians, including the Minister of Finance, were assassinated. Although the coup attempt failed, the military authorities practically took over the Japanese government since then.

# **(5) Period 3 (1937-1951): Immigration Stricken by the War and Its Aftermath**

Faced with the military advance of Japan and the imminent breakout of the warfare between Japan and the United States, Brazil, a close ally of the United States, began to take oppressive measures against _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil. The Brazilian government tried to force _Nikkeijin_ to assimilate to Brazilian society and to become Brazilian rather than Japanese. In an attempt to force assimilation, the Brazilian government prohibited Japanese language education for students under the age of fourteen in 1937. In 1938 the Brazilian new immigration law was enacted, which severely restricted _Nikkeijin_ ’s rights. In that year, Japanese (also German and Italian) language schools were forced to be completely closed in Brazil. In 1939 World War II broke out, and many Japanese immigrants returned to Japan to fight for their country. In 1941 the Japanese language and Japanese newspapers were prohibited in Brazil. The Pacific War (Japan-U.S. War) also broke out in the same year, turning _Nikkeijin_ into people from an enemy country. In 1942 Brazil cut any diplomatic relation with Japan, Germany, and Italy, and further oppressive measures were imposed on _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil. As a result, the number of Japanese immigration to Brazil decreased to zero in that year. Some of the _Nikkeijin_ properties were frozen, and _Nikkeijin_ were expelled from certain districts of large cities for “national security” reasons.

In June 1945, Brazil declared a war against Japan. On August 6 and 9, the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. On August 15, 1945, Japan surrendered to the Allied Nations. In spite of the defeat of Japan in 1945, most _Nikkeijin_ did not believe it, because they did not have any access to information from Japan and they had been told, by pre-war education, that Japan was the nation of the Sacred God, which would never lose. _Nikkeijin_ who did not believe in the Japanese defeat were called “Kachi Gumi (the group of winners)”, whereas those who did were called “Make Gumi (the group of losers). In the following few years after the end of the war, extremist groups of Kachi Gumi carried out terrorist attacks against Make Gum people. Many assassinations 9
of leaders of Make Gumi were made by radical Kachi Gumi members. This conflict between Kachi Gumi and Make Gumi was a tragic event in the history of _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil.

Another tragic incident was the “return home scam.” Since many _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil believed that Japan won the war, they were waiting for the triumphant Japanese ships to arrive in Brazil to save them from their hardship in Brazil. Some scam artists, who were also _Nikkeijin_ , took the advantage of this situation and provided other _Nikkeijin_ false information that a Japanese ship would arrive in, say, the port of Santos the following month. In order to reserve the seat on the ship, people were asked to make an advance payment for the return ticket. Despite such a simple hoax, many _Nikkeijin_ actually became the victims of this scam. In 1950, about 50 members of the right-wing fraud syndicate “Kokumin Zenen Tai (National Vangurd)” were arrested in São Paulo for the return home scam.

In spite of the hardship, Japanese immigrants worked hard, and put an emphasis on education of their descendents. As time went by, successful _Nikkeijin_ emerged in Brazil. For example, in 1951 Mr. Tamaru became the first _Nikkeijin_ parliament member of the State of São Paulo.

# **(6) Period 4 (1952-1987): Post-war Immigration**

In 1952 the Brazilian government approved a resumption of Japanese immigration to Brazil, and the first Japanese immigration ship after World War II arrived in Santos in 1953. After the end of World War II, the Japanese government promoted emigration to mitigate poverty and unemployment in Japan. During World War II, most major cities in Japan, including Tokyo, Osaka, Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Kobe to name a few, were almost completely destroyed by carpet bombing of the U.S. forces. About eighty percent of the production capacity of the Japanese economy was lost. The situation facing Japan at the time was probably worse than that of many developing countries today. In an attempt to ease unemployment, in 1955 the Emigration Bureau (Iju Kyoku) was created in the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The mission of the department was to promote Japanese emigration overseas, mainly to the Americas, e.g. the United States, Brazil, Argentina, and Dominican Republic. As Table 3 shows, the average number of Japanese emigration to Brazil in 1955-1961 was more than 5,000 per year.

However, the wave of the post-war immigration was short-lived because of the economic success of Japan following the war. Although the Japanese economy was severely damaged by the war, Japan showed a swift recovery and a miraculous economic development thanks to effective industrial and trade policies (see Figure 1 for _real_ GDP of Japan). In 1961 the Japanese Prime Minister Ikeda announced the “income doubling plan”, which initiated miraculous economic growth in Japan. As a result of the effective economic policy, the Japanese economy began to show a sign of strong recovery, and the double-digit growth rate continued until the Nixon Shock in 1971. Table 5 reports GDP and per capita GDP of selected OECD countries since 1950. In 10
1950 the GDP per capita of Japan was less than seven percent of that of the United States. The speed of the country’s catch-up was remarkable, and the Japanese per capita income has exceeded that of the Unites States since 1990.<sup>1</sup> Thanks to the prosperity in Japan after the mid-1960s, the movement of people from Japan to Brazil decreased, and foreign direct investment to Brazil rose instead. In the late 1970s, more than 500 Japanese firms went to Brazil. Although the Japanese immigrants before and during the war were Japanese who wanted to return to Japan sooner or later, the Japanese migrants in the post-war period, especially the descendents of the earlier migrants, were _Nikkeijin_ who expected to live permanently in Brazil. Because of the emphasis on education, _Nikkeijin_ are still playing important roles in Brazil today, e.g. many of them have become politicians, doctors, lawyers, and professors.

Since the late 1980s, a great number of _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil have been returning to Japan to make money, which is the migration in the opposite direction to Japanese emigration in the past. The detailed discussion of the return migration of _Nikkeijin_ is given in Section IV below.

# **III. Government Policy toward Migrant Workers in Japan**

# **1. Recent Trend in Number of Migrant Workers in Japan**

While the previous section has examined emigration from Japan, this section will discuss immigration into Japan. Although Japan has a restrictive policy toward foreign workers, their number has been increasing rapidly. Table 6 lists the share of foreign population in the total population in selected countries in 1990. As indicated in the table, only 1.2 percent of the total population was foreign born in East/Southeast Asia, which is substantially less than the share in North America (8.6%) or Europe (5.0%). The foreign born population had a relatively larger share in some internationalized countries (areas) such as Hong Kong (40.0%) and Singapore (15.5%). In total the share of foreigners in Japan was only 0.9 percent, which was among the lowest in the world.

Nevertheless, the share has been increasing rapidly since the 1990s. Table 7 shows the changes in the aggregate number of registered foreigners in Japan since 1978. The number of registered foreigners almost doubled from 1.1 million in 1990 to 2 million in 2005. The share of foreign population in 2004 was 1.6 percent. Even if the share is still smaller than that of most countries in the world, the rate of increase has been dramatic. Table 8 presents the number of registered foreigners by regions. Three quarters are from Asian countries, while the share of people from South America was 18.2 percent in 2004, most of them being _Nikkeijin_ from Brazil, as will be discussed further in the next

> 1 Needless to say, it is difficult to compare the GDP of one country with that of another country, because the international comparison depends on the foreign exchange rates between their currencies.

11
section.

# **2. Basic Principles of the Japanese Immigration Policy**

Let us examine the basic principles of the Japanese immigration policy. The policy of the Japanese government toward migrant workers is very clear. The Ninth Basic Plan of Employment Measures, approved by the Cabinet in August 1999, presents three principles for the Japanese immigration policy as follows (translation by the author):

- (i) As for foreign workers with professional skills, their immigration to Japan should be promoted in order to vitalize economy and society of Japan, and to promote further internationalization of Japan;

- (ii) As for the so-called unskilled foreign workers, their immigration should be carefully monitored given that their admission is likely to have a serious impact on the economy and society of Japan and the lives of Japanese citizens;

- (iii) It is improper to consider immigration as a way to cope with the expected labor shortage due to the aging population and declined fertility in Japan. In order to deal with the labor shortage, it is important to create a society where elderly and women can actively participate in the labor market.

From the above, it is clear that the Japanese government welcomes professional and skilled foreign workers, but prohibits admission of unskilled foreign workers with some exceptions, e.g., _Nikkeijin_ as discussed below. However, it has been argued in recent years that Japan should accept more foreign workers, both skilled and unskilled. Since the Japanese population is rapidly aging, the country will not be able to cope with possible labor shortage without accepting immigration at a large scale. Furthermore, it is argued that migration to Japan benefits sending countries by increasing their GDP through remittances sent back by migrants. For this reason Japan, one of the richest countries in the world, has a responsibility to admit migrant workers from poor developing countries.

# **3. Three Categories of Migrant Workers in Japan**

# **(1)** **_Legal Skilled Workers_**

Table 9 summarizes the number of migrant workers in Japan by visa categories in 2002. As shown in the table, the number of legal and skilled workers is very small, only about 0.3 percent (179,643) of the total Japanese labor force. Even when unskilled workers, mostly from Latin America, are included, the number of legal migrant workers makes up 0.62 percent (413,536) of the labor force. This is partly due to the strict Japanese immigration law, which severely restricts the number of jobs that foreign workers are allowed to take in the country. Therefore, most legal foreign workers, except for Latin Americans of Japanese origin, _Nikkeijin_ , are professional workers, such as professors, researchers, lawyers, and accountants. In comparison with the European countries, the share of legal foreign workers in the labor force is extremely small. For instance, the 12
share of migrant workers, including illegal migrants, in the total labor force in Japan is less than one percent. In contrast, the same figure for France and Germany is around seven percent and it is as high as seventeen percent in Switzerland.

Despite the limited number of skilled and professional migrant workers in Japan, there are two groups of migrant workers that have dramatically increased in recent years: (i) illegal unskilled workers from neighboring Asian countries, and (ii) legal Latin American workers of Japanese origin. These two groups will be discussed in the following sections.

# **(2)** **_Illegal Unskilled Workers_**

Although the number of migrant workers (both legal and illegal) in Japan is still less than a million, it increased substantially since the mid-1980s until the severe economic recession curbed the inflow in the 1990s. As Figure 2 shows, the number of illegal foreign workers apprehended by the authorities sharply increased from 2,339 in 1983 to 64,341 in 1993. Although the number declined slightly since then due to the severe recession of the Japanese economy, the number of illegal migrant workers is far greater than the level before the mid 1980s. Needless to say, these numbers represent only a small part of the total illegal foreign workers in Japan. According to the Ministry of Justice, the total number of illegal foreign workers in Japan is currently estimated to be about 200,000 to 300,000.

Just as most illegal aliens in the United States come from Mexico and other neighboring countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, most illegal foreign workers in Japan come from neighboring Asian countries (see Table 10). Since the wage rate in their home countries is extremely low, even compared with a discriminatory low wage rate by Japanese standard, potential income gains are one of the main determinants of this migration.

The recent influx of Asian workers is markedly different from earlier migrations. Until the mid 1980s most illegal foreign workers were women who worked as bar hostesses (the so-called " _Japayuki San_ (Miss Japan-going)"). In 1983-84, for example, more than 90 percent of illegal foreign workers were female. However, the number of male workers dramatically increased to about 50-80 percent of the total number of illegal immigrants (see Figure 2). As shown in Table 11, in 2004, about a quarter of the illegal male workers were construction workers, and 36 percent of female workers were bar hostesses. As in many other parts of the world, most illegal aliens are taking work that few Japanese want to do because of unfavorable working conditions. It should be noted that about two-thirds of the illegal migrants are working in the non-tradable sectors, such as construction and service industries.

# **(3)** **_Legal Unskilled Workers – Migrant Workers of Japanese Origin (Nikkeijin)_**

In addition to the illegal foreign workers discussed above, there has been a remarkable 13
increase in the number of _Nikkeijin_ workers. They come from Latin American countries with a history of Japanese immigration such as Brazil, Argentina, Peru, and Bolivia. The arrival of these workers is mainly due to the revised immigration law in Japan, which was enacted in 1989 and was put into effect in June 1990. Since the wage rate in Japan is much higher (and Japanese society is much safer) than that in Latin America, a great number of Latin Americans of Japanese origin were attracted to Japan. According to the media, some of these immigrants fell into huge debt to pay for their travel cost, and other people without Japanese origin were arrested for forgery of their birth certificate or for using some other person's identification. Figure 3 shows the increase in the number of _Nikkeijin_ workers since 1988. While the number of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan was only eight thousand at the end of 1988 (the year before the revised immigration law was enacted), it doubled every year to reach around 8,000 in June 1991. In 2004, the number of _Nikkeijin_ staying in Japan was 250,734.

# **4.** **_Reasons for the Sharp Increase – Push and Pull_**

Why did many unskilled foreign workers suddenly come to Japan after the middle of the 1980s? It is clear that the most important reason for the increase in the _Nikkeijin_ workers from Latin America is the change in the Japanese immigration policy in 1990. In contrast, the reasons for the influx of illegal foreign workers from neighboring Asian countries are not so obvious.

One of the most important factors is that a push-force in neighboring Asian countries coincided with a pull-force in the Japanese economy in the 1980s. As far as the supply side is concerned, one of the most important reasons for the sharp increase was probably the decline in the demand for Asian migrant workers in the Middle East. In the 1970s, an increasing number of Asians had been recruited to work at construction sites in the oil producing Middle Eastern countries. When the price of crude oil quadrupled after the First Oil Crisis in 1973, a construction boom occurred in the oil-rich countries. Given the relatively small population size of these countries in the Middle East, they started to recruit a large number of temporary immigrants mostly from southern Europe and Asia. As a result, the number of migrant workers from eight Asian countries (Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Thailand, and the Republic of Korea) to the Middle East grew from a little more than 0.1 million in 1976 to more than 1.2 million in 1982. Nevertheless, as the price of crude oil went down in the 1980s, the construction boom in the Middle East subsided, and some 400,000 Asian migrant workers lost their jobs and had to return to their home countries.

The return of these workers was a serious blow to the Asian sending countries, since remittances from the migrant workers had become an important source of foreign exchange. In Pakistan and Bangladesh, for example, remittances from migrant workers were almost as large as the total value of their exports. The slowdown in the Middle East created a large pool of Asian worker who were eager to find new jobs in some other countries. To these unemployed workers, Japan, one of their rich neighbors, appeared as the new land of opportunity.

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The increase in the supply pressure coincided with the increased demand of Japanese businesses for migrant labor. Due to the strong performance of the Japanese economy, the labor market in Japan became very tight in the mid-1980s. The performance of the Japanese economy after the middle of the 1980s was impressive: the annual growth rates of the real GNP in 1988, 1989, and 1990 were 6.2 percent, 4.7 percent, and 5.6 percent respectively; those of industrial production in 1988, 1989, and 1990 were 9.5 percent, 6.1 percent, and 4.6 percent respectively. Consequently, the labor market became tight, and the job-opening/job-seeker ratio (one of the most commonly used indicators of the labor market condition in Japan) sharply increased. While the ratio nose-dived in 1975 (the First Oil Recession) and stayed at around 0.6 (i.e., only six jobs were available for every 10 job seekers), it began to increase after 1987. In 1988 the ratio exceeded one for the first time since 1974, and it went as high as 1.40 in 1990. The labor shortages were especially felt in the construction and service industries. Moreover, due to the decline in the number of domestic marginal workers (i.e., seasonal workers called " _dekasegi_ "), the demand for migrant workers to fill the gap in this marginal labor market also increased.

A typical practice of Japanese firms in boom years has been to increase the number of marginal workers, such as seasonal and temporary workers, because firms have at least a moral obligation to keep their _regular_ employees on the payroll even in a recession. However, the construction industry was losing an important supply source of domestic non-regular workers. Until the 1980s, the labor shortage in the construction industry in boom years had been largely filled by seasonal workers, _dekasegi_ . They were mostly farmers in the northern part of Japan who came to metropolitan areas like Tokyo and Osaka to take temporary jobs in an attempt to supplement their farm incomes in the farmers' slack season. In the early 1970s, the number of _dekasegi_ amounted to about 600,000 (Goto, 1990). However, because of increased job opportunities in their home towns the number began to diminish steadily. According to the Japanese Ministry of Labor, only 142,200 _dekasegi_ were reported in 1993. The decline in the supply of _dekasegi_ , along with the construction boom, created a serious labor shortage in the construction industry. The strong demand for marginal workers in the Japanese construction industry attracted an increasing number of foreign workers who were facing the decreasing demand for their labor in the Middle East.

Given the strong push- and pull-forces, illegal mediators between Japanese employers and Asian migrants (like the "coyote" figure for Mexican illegal aliens in the United States) have become prevalent. Although the details of their illegal activities are unknown, involvement of gangsters has often been reported. According to an estimate by the Japanese Ministry of Justice, in 1990 about 70 percent of illegal migrant workers entered Japan with the help of such illegal mediators.

# **IV.** **_Nikkeijin_ Workers in Japan and the Japanese Government Policy towards them**

# **1.  Dramatic Increase since the Beginning of the 1990s**

15
The influx of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan is due to the revision of the Japanese immigration law in 1990. As mentioned above, foreigners are prohibited from taking unskilled jobs in Japan, in principle. However, the revision of the immigration law added a visa category of “long term resident ( _teijusha_ )”. The law allowed anyone whose parent or grandparent was Japanese (second and third generations) to apply for the “long term resident visa”. Long term residents can stay in Japan for three years, and they can take any activities in Japan including the unskilled work. As a result, a great number of _Nikkeijin_ began to come to Japan to make quick money. Table 12 shows the number of “long term residents” by sending countries. As indicated in the table, in 2004, more than half (57.6%) of the long term residents were Brazilians.

The increase in the number of Brazilians coming to Japan has been dramatic. Figure 4 presents the number of Brazilians staying in Japan since 1988. While there were only 4,159 Brazilians in Japan in 1988, the number jumped to 56,429 in 1990. Since then, the number of Brazilian immigrants has increased almost every year to 286,557 in 2004, which is seventy times as high as that in 1988. Moreover, many Brazilians are repeat migrants, who come back to Japan in a few years after they return to their home country. Table 13 shows the number of entry of Brazilians to Japan since 1999. As indicated, about half of Brazilians are repeat migrants.

In the early 1990s, most of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan were single males, who intended to stay for a few years and to return home with big money earned in Japan. They therefore remitted a large portion of their income to their home country. However, the _Nikkeijin_ workers have begun to stay for a longer period and to live in Japan with their families. Some of them obtained permanent residency in Japan. The more they take root in Japan, the less remittance they may send to their home country. In the following section, I will first briefly discuss the situation of _Nikkeijin_ workers in the early 1990s. Then I will examine what kind of changes emerged in the characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers in more recent years, and discuss how these changes affect the amount of future remittances to their home country.

# **2.** **_Nikkeijin_ Workers in the Early 1990s --Single Males in Car Parts Factory**<sup>**2**</sup>

The Japanese Ministry of Labour published results of a survey on _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan in 1991, and the following discussion is mainly based on the outcome of this survey. According to the survey, about two thirds of the _Nikkeijin_ were male, and the majority of them were under thirty years old. About two-thirds were coming to Japan without family, and only 13 percent were accompanied by their entire family. Almost all (more than 90 percent) of these males were working as production workers in the manufacturing sector. Of these, approximately one-third were employed in the transport equipment production sector (most of them in car parts factories). This constituted a striking contrast with illegal unskilled workers from Asia, who were employed mainly

> 2 The discussion in this subsection is largely based on Goto (1993).

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# in the non-tradable sectors, such as construction and services.

In terms of working conditions in the early years, there was no substantial difference between the hourly wage of the _Nikkeijin_ workers and that of their Japanese counterparts. Since _Nikkeijin_ were legally employed, employers tended to pay them at regular hourly wage rates. However, the annual income of these _Nikkeijin_ workers was much smaller than that of Japanese workers, because most of the _Nikkeijin_ workers were employed on a daily basis and paid by the hour. Note that, in terms of wage structure, blue-collar production workers in Japan are similar to white-collar workers in the United States. Most of the blue-collar production workers in Japan receive a monthly salary (instead of hourly wages). Further, these salaried workers receive bonus payments twice a year and enjoy various fringe benefits. The bonus payment in Japan constitutes a substantial part of their annual income – the amount of average bonus is equal to five month salary. Therefore, even though the hourly wage rate of _Nikkeijin_ workers was similar to that of the Japanese counterpart, their annual income was much smaller than Japanese workers because most of _Nikkeijin_ workers did not receive bonus payment and fringe benefits.

Moreover, the _Nikkeijin_ workers were often exploited by brokers or mediators. According to the survey result, less than half of _Nikkeijin_ workers were directly employed by the firm where they actually worked. More than half of _Nikkeijin_ workers were employed by mediator agencies and were sent by them to the factories.<sup>3</sup> Hence the actual income of _Nikkeijin_ workers was usually smaller than what the factories were paying for their work. In some cases, exploitation by gangsters was also reported. In addition, the above survey reveals that most of the _Nikkeijin_ workers were working without medical insurance and unemployment insurance.<sup>4</sup> In Japan almost 100 percent of workers (and their family) are covered by a very generous government-sponsored medical insurance program. Workers contribute to the medical insurance program according to their income and the deductibles are nominal. No matter how high the actual medical cost is, the payment out of the patient’s pocket does not exceed about 500 dollars a month and the balance is paid by the insurance program. Very poor people can enjoy the same benefit as the others without contributing anything. Nevertheless, according to the survey, only 23 percent of the _Nikkeijin_ workers were covered by the medical insurance program, probably because neither the employers nor the _Nikkeijin_ workers themselves wanted to pay their contributions to the program. But this implies that in case of illness or accident these _Nikkeijin_ workers had to pay 100 percent of their

> 3 As shown in Table 17, this wais still the case in 2003. In 2003 more than 64 percent of _Nikkeijins_ are employed through mediators and contractors.

> 4 Thanks to the efforts by central and local governments, most _Nikkeijins_ are now covered by the unemployment insurance system. However, many _Nikkeijins_ are still outside of the coverage of medical insurance. The reason for the low coverage of medical insurance is believed that medical insurance and pension are presented as a package (i.e., if someone wishes to participate in the public medical insurance, he or she has to be enrolled in the national pension system as well). Since _Nikkeijin_ does not think he or she would stay in Japan for more than twenty years, when he or she becomes eligible to receive pension), he or she tends to decline the public medical insurance in order to avoid contribution to the pension system.

17
medical expenses out of pocket.

# **3.** **_Nikkeijin_ Workers in Recent Years: Settlers with Family**

# **(1) From Temporary Guest Workers to Settlers**

When an increasing number of Brazilian _Nikkeijin_ began to come to Japan in the early 1990s, most of them were “ _dekasegi_ ” workers (i.e., temporary guest workers), who stayed in Japan just for a few years and went back to their home country with a fortune made in Japan. However, in recent years, the Brazilians have begun to settle in Japan, just as the Japanese emigrants did in Brazil about 100 years earlier. Figure 5 shows the result of a survey on _Nikkeijin_ ’s length of stay in Japan, which was conducted by Sangyo Koyo Antei Sentah (Industry Employment Security Center) in 2002. As the table indicates, almost 80 percent of _Nikkeijin_ workers stayed in Japan for more than three years. Twenty-eight percent of them stayed in Japan for more than 10 years. This is probably due to the fact that it was very difficult for _Nikkeijin dekasegi_ workers to quickly make a great amount of money under the stagnant Japanese economy. In addition, it was hard for them to find good jobs in Brazil after returning home due to the Brazilian stagnant economy. Although the long-term resident visa is valid only for three years initially, the Japanese government is generous to allow those Brazilians to apply for renewals. Unless they commit a crime, the renewal is almost automatic.

After two or three renewals, they can apply even for a permanent resident visa, which is extremely difficult to obtain for foreigners other than _Nikkeijin._ As a result, the number of permanent residents from Brazil has been rapidly increasing in recent years. Table 14 presents the change in the number of permanent residents by nationality since 2000. As indicated in the table, the overall number of permanent residents increased only by 18 percent from 657,605 in 2000 to 778,583 in 2004. However, the increase for Brazilians is remarkable. While there were only 9,062 permanent residents from Brazil in 2000, the number in 2004 (52,581) was almost six times larger. As a result, while the Brazilian _dekasegi_ workers used to predominantly be on a long-term resident visa in the early 1990s, the share of long term residents decreased to about half (52%) of the total Brazilians staying in Japan in 2002 (see Figure 6). Thirty-four percent of Brazilians entered Japan with a visa for spouse etc. of Japanese citizens, and 12 percent were staying in Japan with a permanent resident visa in that year.

As _Nikkeijin_ from Brazil stay longer in Japan, they bring their family to Japan. The male _dekasegi_ workers started to bring their wives and children from Brazil. Table 15 shows such a tendency. The table compares the number of Brazilians by age and gender in 2002 with those in 1992. The share of working-age Brazilians (15 to 64 years old) in 1992 was 91.5 percent, but it dropped to 84.4 percent by 2002. On the other hand, the share of children (0-14 years old) increased by seven percentage points from 8.3 percent in 1992 to 15.2 percent in 2002.

As discussed in detail below, the increase in spouses and children has generated various 18
problems including those related to the education of their children in Japan and daily life in the Japanese community.

# **(2) Clustered Cities**

_Nikkeijin_ migrants from Brazil tend to be clustered in certain cities and towns, where employment in the manufacturing industry is available. About 60 percent of foreign residents are clustered in 15 towns and cities as shown in Table 16. The table indicates the share of foreign residents (and Brazilians) in total population in each municipality. While the share of Brazilians in the total population of Japan is 0.21 percent, the Brazilian shares in the population of these fifteen cities are much higher than the national average. For example, in Oizumi Town in Gunma Prefecture, where the number of total population is 41,284, more than 4,000 inhabitants are Brazilian. The share of Brazilians in Oizumi Town thus exceeds 10 percent (11.4%). In certain living districts in these cities, the concentration is even greater. For instance, in Homi Housing District in Toyota City in Aichi Prefecture where about 10,000 people are living, the number of Brazilians is as high as 4,000, or 40 percent. Since very few Brazilians speak Japanese, and since social custom in Japan is very different from that in Brazil, the Brazilians often encounter various problems: e.g. while a party with Samba music at midnight might be common in Brazil, such behavior often results in a serious conflict with Japanese neighbors.

Due to the clustering, the municipal governments of the cities with a large number of foreign residents, mostly Brazilians, face many challenges. In May 2001, mayors from 13 municipal governments of such cities formed “Gaikokujin Shuju Toshi Kaigi (Congress of Major Cities where Foreign Residents Concentrate to Live)”. This was an attempt to achieve harmonious living by foreign residents in these Japanese communities.

As for employment of the _Nikkeijin_ workers, Table 17 shows that almost all of them (86.0%) are employed in the manufacturing industry. That is different from other (illegal) foreign unskilled workers, most of who are employed in the service sectors. It should be noted that two-thirds (64.3%) of _Nikkeijin_ workers obtain employment through private mediators and contractors as mentioned above.

The municipalities with the concentration of foreign residents provide public housing to foreigners. Table 18 shows the current rate of foreign households’ occupancy of public housing in selected municipalities. In these cities, more than 10% (13.7%) of public housing is occupied by foreign residents. This is particularly true in Iwata City in Shizuoka Prefecture where more than a quarter of public housing is occupied by foreign residents.

# **(3) Problems with Education and Crime**

The increased number of children of _Nikkeijin_ workers has caused various problems, of 19
which the education of _Nikkeijin_ children and their high crime rates are two primary concerns. As Table 15 shows, the number of school-age children (5-14 years) tripled in 10 years. While the number of school-age children was 7,244 in 1992, it increased to 23,610 in 2002. It is surprising to observe a high non-attendance ratio among _Nikkeijin_ children. One of the main reasons for the poor attendance is their lack of Japanese language skills, which poses difficulties in following the class. Another possible explanation is the high tuition fees of Brazilian-language schools in Japan. Table 19 shows the number of school-age foreign residents and the number of the school enrolment in cities where foreign residents are concentrated. As indicated in the table, absenteeism of foreign children, mostly _Nikkeijin_ children, is appalling. More than a quarter of _Nikkeijin_ children do not attend school, which is a striking difference compared to the enrollment rate of Japanese children that is 99.9 percent.

Absenteeism often results in juvenile delinquency. Table 20 summarizes the change in the number of criminal offences by Brazilians and Peruvians since 1992. Between 1992 and 2002, for instance, the number of foreign residents from Brazil increased by 80 percent from 147,803 to 268,332. The number of criminal offences committed by Brazilians also increased dramatically. In 2002 the number of crimes committed by Brazilian reached 4,967, which is 22 times larger than that in 1992 (222). That constitutes a sharp contrast with Peruvians in Japan. While there is no clear increase in criminal offences by Peruvians, those committed by Brazilians have increased sharply in recent years. Moreover, the number of criminal offences per Brazilian resident is much higher than that of Peruvians. Criminal offences are particularly serious among Brazilian juveniles. Brazil tops the rank in terms of the number of juvenile crimes committed by foreign residents in Japan.

# **(4) Policies of the Japanese Governments towards** **_Nikkeijin_ in Japan**

Faced with the increasing number of _Nikkeijin_ workers and their families in the country, the Japanese governments, both central and local, are taking various policy measures to assist the living of _Nikkeijin_ , and to achieve harmonious coexistence of Japanese and _Nikkeijin_ . The following is a partial listing of such policy measures.

# **(i) Measures taken by the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare**

- Interpreters of Portuguese and Spanish at 62 public employment security offices

- Job counseling specially designed for _Nikkeijin_ Workers at the employment service centers for _Nikkeijin_ (at Tokyo and Aichi Prefecture)

- Job counseling for prospective _dekasegi_ workers in São Paulo

- Leaflets on job openings in Portuguese and Spanish

- Assistance to _Nikkeijin_ juveniles to find jobs in Japan

# **(ii) Measures taken by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology**

- Special teachers who give necessary assistance to non Japanese-speaking students

- School counselors who assist students and parents coming from abroad

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* Special curriculum for non Japanese-speaking students

# **(iii) Measures taken by the local governments (especially of clustered cities)**

* Leaflets and newsletters in foreign language (Portuguese, Spanish, English etc.) on the life in Japan

- Counseling centers in various foreign languages

- Free medical examinations for foreign residents

- Special personnel to assist students from foreign countries

- Japanese language education

# **(5) Remittances**

In many developing countries, e.g. the Philippines, remittances are a very important source of income. This is also the case in Brazil. According to Beltrão and Sonoe (2006), remittances by _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan are estimated to be US$2 billion annually, almost equal to the annual exports from Brazil to Japan.

There are a few studies on the amount of remittances to Brazil from each _Nikkeijin_ worker. Nihon Rodo Kenkyu Kikou (Japan Institute of Labour) conducted interviews in 1993 and 1998 among _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil who had working experience in Japan.<sup>5</sup> According to the survey, average monthly remittances from each _dekasegi_ worker were US$1,664 and US$1848 in 1993 and 1998 respectively. In 1993 the average amount of monthly remittance (US$1,664) was almost three times higher than the average monthly income in Brazil (US$623). Also in 1998, the amount of monthly remittances (US$1,848) was a little higher than monthly income in Brazil (US$1,806).

Commissioned by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Microfinance International Corporation (2005) did a similar study on remittances of Latin Americans working in Japan.<sup>6</sup> This study reports that seventy percent of Latin Americans working in Japan remit regularly. According to the study, these migrants remit 14.5 times a year, and the average amount of remittance each time is US$600. This implies that they remit US$8,700 annually, and that the average amount of monthly remittance is US$725, which is far less than the amount based on the study by the Japan Institute of Labor.

While the amount of total remittances by _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan is enormous at present, the current level of remittance flows from Japan to Brazil may not last in the future. As discussed above, an increasing number of _Nikkeijin_ workers are changing status from temporary _dekasegi_ workers to settlers in Japan. In 2004 the number of permanent residents from Brazil exceeded 50,000, and the number has been increasing rapidly in recent years. The longer they stay, the less they might remit. The history of Turkish guest workers in Germany has shown the decline in the amount of remittances sent back to Turkey as the guest workers settled in the host country.

> 5 See Appendix II for the methodology used for these surveys.

> 6 See Appendix II for the methodology used for this survey.

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# **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
methodologies, namely “snowball sampling” and “intercept sampling” techniques. The former is a technique where a sampling frame will be built up from a certain number of “seed” _Nikkei_ households, i.e., these seed households are asked to provide referrals to other households with the _Nikkeijin_ community. In contrast, the latter involves interviews taking place during set time periods at a number of pre-specified well-defined locations that are frequented by _Nikkeijin_ . These two alternatives are a non-probability sampling technique. It is obviously more ideal to obtain data based on a probability sampling. However, it is generally a difficult task to construct a sampling frame for sub-groups of population who migrate, send or receive remittances. The fact that these sub-groups are typically “rare elements” in the population makes this task hard. The findings of the survey will therefore help us assess how representative data the alternative sampling approaches can generate in case the probability-sampling technique is not feasible or too costly.

In sum, given the relatively extensive and detailed questions of the survey, this dataset will certainly advance our understanding of not only the Japan-Brazil migration and remittance corridor, but also of migration and remittance behavior in general. The data will also allow us to investigate the robustness of some of the existing findings on the Japan-Brazil corridor presented in this paper. Finally, the outcome of the survey will have some methodological contributions to migration-related studies.

# **VI. Concluding Remarks**

This paper has examined the background and major characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan. Section II examined the history of Japanese emigration to Latin America (mostly Brazil). Section III discussed immigration in Japan in general. In response to the revision of the immigration law and the relatively straightforward procedure for renewing visas and also for obtaining permanent residency for _Nikkeijin_ , the share of _Nikkeijin_ workers in the total migrant workers in Japan dramatically increased in the 1990s. Section IV discussed the main characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan. _Nikkeijin_ workers in the early 1990s were mostly temporary guest workers, who intended to return home in a few years with a fortune made in Japan. However, they have gradually begun to settle in Japan with their families. Since _Nikkeijin_ are clustered in certain cities (e.g. Hamamatsu, Toyota, Toyoshashi, and Oizumi), the social and economic impacts of _Nikkeijin_ workers on these cities are enormous. Governments, as well as NGOs, are therefore making various efforts to create harmonious living of _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japanese communities. Section IV pointed out that, while the current amount of remittances by _Nikkeijin_ is non-trivial, this may not last in the future, because the amount of remittances tends to decline as migrant workers start settling in the destination country.

Although I have presented various data on _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan, more studies on _Nikkeijin_ and remittances are clearly needed. First, while there are various studies on the characteristics of _Nikkeijin_ workers and remittances, most of them are based on ad hoc interviews, and therefore the results vary widely from study to study. For example, 23
according to the study by the Japan Institute of Labor, the average amount of monthly remittances was about $1,664 -- $1,848, while the study commissioned by the IDB reported a far smaller amount of $725. Thus, accumulation of ad hoc survey results do not seem very useful for understanding _Nikkeijin_ workers in Japan and future prospect of remittances from those workers. Secondly, an econometric study is clearly needed in addition to descriptive analyses. In order to forecast the future remittances, for instance, it would be useful to estimate elasticity of the amount of remittances with respect to, say, the length of stay, and the number of family members in each _Nikkeijin_ household. For these ends, the availability of the _Brazil Nikkei Household Survey_ data described in Section V will certainly help us deepen our understanding of the migration and remittance behavior of _Nikkei_ migrants and their future prospects.

24
# **Bibliography**

Beltrão, K. I. and S. Sonoe (2006) “Permanentemente Temporário: Dekasseguis Brasileiros no Japão”, mimeo, IBGE, Brazil.

De Carvalho, D. (2003) _Migrants and Identity in Japan and Brazil: The Nikkeijin_ , London and New York: Routledge Curzon.

Kikumura-Yano, A. (2002) _Encyclopedia of Japanese Descendants in the Americas: An Illustrated History of the Nikkeijin_ , Tokyo: Japanese American National Museum.

Takahashi, Y. (1993) _Nikkeijin Burajiru Iminshi_ (A History of _Nikkeijin_ in Brazil), Tokyo: San-Ichi Shobo (in Japanese).

Goto, J. (1990) _Gaikokujin Rodo no Keizaigaku_ (Economic Analysis of Migrant Workers), Tokyo: Toyo Keizai Shimposha (in Japanese).

Goto, J. (1993) _Gaikokujin Rodosha to Nihon Keizai_ (Migrant Workers and Japanese Economy), Tokyo: Yuhikaku (in Japanese).

The Japan Institute of Labor (1995) “Nikkeijin Rodosha no Jukyu Sistem to Shuro Keiken” (Demand-Supply System and Work Experiences of Nikkeijin Workers), Tokyo (in Japanese).

Japanese Ministry of Labor (1991) “Gaikokujin Rodosha ga Rodomentou ni oyobosu eikyoutou ni kannsuru kennkyuukai senmon bukai houkokusho” (A Report of Committee on the Impact of Migrant Workers on Employment and Labor in Japan), Tokyo (in Japanese).

McKenzie, D. and J. Mistiaen (2007) “Surveying Migrant Households: A Comparison of Census-Based, Snowball, and Intercept Surveys”, mimeo, Washington, D.C.: World Bank.

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**Table 1: Number of** **_Nikkeijin_ in Brazil** **<u>(1923-2006, estimates)</u>**

|Year|Number|
|---|---|
|1923|39,249|
|1932|133,358|
|1940|205,850|
|1958|430,151|
|1976|800,000|
|1986|1,075,133|
|1996|1,444,889|
|2006|1,941,810|

Source: Carvalho (2003).

**Table 2: Japanese emigrants to Latin American countries**

||**1899**|**-1941**|**Post**|**-1945**|**T**|**otal**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||**number**|**share(%)**|**number**|**share(%) **|**number **|**share(%)**|
|Total|257,575|100.00|86,427|100.00|344,002|100.00|
|Argentina|5,398|2.10|12,066|13.96|17,464|5.08|
|Bolivia|202|0.08|6,357|7.36|6,559|1.91|
|Brazil|202,025|78.43|53,555|61.97|255,58|74.30|
|Chile|519|0.20||0.00|519|0.15|
|Colombia|229|0.09||0.00|229|0.07|
|Cuba|686|0.27||0.00|686|0.20|
|Dominica||0.00|1,39|1.61|1,39|0.40|
|Mexico|14,476|5.62|671|0.78|15,147|4.40|
|Panama|415|0.16||0.00|415|0.12|
|Paraguay|521|0.20|9,612|11.12|10,133|2.95|
|Peru|33,07|12.84|2,615|3.03|35,685|10.37|
|Uruguay|18|0.01||0.00|18|0.01|
|Venezuela|12|0.00||0.00|12|0.00|
|Others|4|0.00|161|0.19|165|0.05|

Source: Compiled from the data in Carvalho (2003).

26
**Table 3**

**Number of Japanese emigrants to Brazil, 1908-1986**

|**Year **|**Number **|**Year **|**Number **|**Year **|**Number **|**Year **|**Number**|**Year **|**Number**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|1908|830|1924|2 673|1940|1 268|1956|4 912|1972|352|
|1909|31|1925|6 333|1941|1 548|1957|6 147|1973|492|
|1910|948|1926|8 407|1942|0|1958|6 586|1974|239|
|1911|28|1927|9 084|1943|0|1959|7 123|1975|254|
|1912|2 909|1928|11 169|1944|0|1960|7 746|1976|1 126|
|1913|7 122|1929|16 648|1945|0|1961|6 824|1977|682|
|1914|3 675|1930|14 074|1946|6|1962||1978|584|
|1915|65|1931|5 632|1947|1|1963|2 124|1979|500|
|1916|165|1932|11 678|1948|1|1964|1 138|1980|562|
|1917|3 899|1933|24 494|1949|4|1965|903|1981|417|
|1918|5 599|1934|21 930|1950|33|1966|937|1982|329|
|1919|3 022|1935|9 611|1951|106|1967|1 070|1983|289|
|1920|1 013|1936|3 306|1952|261|1968|597|1984|261|
|1921|840|1937|4 557|1953|1 928|1969|496|1985|258|
|1922||1938|2 524|1954|3 119|1970|435|1986|363|
|1923|895|1939|1 414|1955|4 051|1971|452|Total|######|

Source: Carvalho (2003)

**Table 4:** **<u>Crop Share of</u>** **_Nikkeijin_ Farmers in Brazil**

||1912|1922|1932|1942|1958|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Coffee|92.6|52.2|59|24.3|27.5|
|Rice|2.5|17.6|8.3|4.5|3|
|Cotton|1.2|12.1|14|39.2|20.5|
|Kinko|0.6|10.2|13|19.9|34.1|
|Other|3.1|7.9|5.7|12.1|14.9|
|Total|100|100|100|100|100|

Source: Kikumura-Yano, A. (2002).

27
||**Table 5: N**<br> <br>(Value, in|**ational Inc**<br>GDP<br>$billions)|**ome of**|**Selected O**<br>|**ECD Cou**<br> <br>(Value, in|**ntries**<br>GDP per c<br>$)|apita||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||Japan|USA|UK|Germany|Japan|USA|UK|Germany|
|1950|109|2883|377|234|131|1897|744|468|
|1960|440|5153|727|722|468|2852|1390|1302|
|1970|2033|10155|1249|1846|1949|4952|2254|3041|
|1980|10632|27319|5353|8185|9103|11996|9567|13296|
|1990|30522|58033|9946|15470|24718|23209|17377|24458|
|2000|47661|98247|14409|18752|37574|34796|24571|22844|
||(Index, US<br>|A=100.0)<br>||<br>|(Index,<br>|USA=100.<br>|0)<br>||
||Japan|USA|UK|Germany|Japan|USA|UK|Germany|
|1950|3.8|100.0|13.1|8.1|6.9|100.0|39.2|24.7|
|1960|8.5|100.0|14.1|14.0|16.4|100.0|48.7|45.7|
|1970|20.0|100.0|12.3|18.2|39.4|100.0|45.5|61.4|
|1980|38.9|100.0|19.6|30.0|75.9|100.0|79.8|110.8|
|1990|52.6|100.0|17.1|26.7|106.5|100.0|74.9|105.4|
|2000|48.5<br>(Source) IM|100.0<br>F|14.7|19.1|108.0|100.0|70.6|65.7|

28
|**Table 6: Foreign Po**|**pulation in Selected**|**Countries**|[1990]|
|---|---|---|---|
||Total population<br>(thousand)|Foreign population<br>(thousand)|Foreigner ratio<br>(%)|
|East/Southeast Asia|652,927|7,594|1.2|
|Japan|123,267|1,075|0.9|
|Korea|42,663|900|2.1|
|Malaysia|17,670|745|4.2|
|Singapore|2,690|418|15.5|
|Taiwan|19,080|1,508|7.9|
|Hong Kong|5,680|2,271|40.0|
|Thailand|55,138|314|0.6|
|North America|276,384|23,868|8.6|
|Canada|27,606|4,266|15.5|
|United States|248,778|19,603|7.9|
|Europe|498,740|24,908|5.0|
|France|56,563|5,897|10.4|
|Germany|79,195|5,037|6.4|
|Switzerland|6,804|1,092|16.0|
|United Kingdom|57,332|3,718|6.5|
|Latin America|402,285|6,550|1.6|
|Argentina|32,325|1,675|5.2|
|Brazil|147,134|1,138|0.8|
|World|5,926,830|120,000|2.0|

Source: United Nations, Japanese Ministry of Labor, U.S. Census Bureau 29
**Table 7**

|**The cha**<br>**Year**|**nges in aggregate**<br>**Total number**|**number of regist**<br>**Year-on-year**<br>**rate (%)**|**ered forei**<br>**Index**|**gners(as of end of eachyear)**<br>**The share in total**<br>**population of Japan (%)**|
|---|---|---|---|---|
|1978|766,894||39|0.67|
|1979|774,505|1.0|39|0.67|
|1980|782,910|1.1|40|0.67|
|1981|792,946|1.3|40|0.67|
|1982|802,477|1.2|41|0.68|
|1983|817,129|1.8|41|0.68|
|1984|840,885|2.9|43|0.70|
|1985|850,612|1.2|43|0.70|
|1986|867,237|2|44|0.71|
|1987|884,025|1.9|45|0.72|
|1988|941,005|6.4|48|0.77|
|1989|984,455|4.6|50|0.80|
|1990|1,075,317|9.2|54|0.87|
|1991|1,218,891|13.4|62|0.98|
|1992|1,281,644|5.1|65|1.03|
|1993|1,320,748|3.1|67|1.06|
|1994|1,354,011|2.5|69|1.08|
|1995|1,362,371|0.6|69|1.08|
|1996|1,415,136|3.9|72|1.12|
|1997|1,482,707|4.8|75|1.18|
|1998|1,512,116|2.0|77|1.20|
|1999|1,556,113|2.9|79|1.23|
|2000|1,686,444|8.4|85|1.33|
|2001|1,778,462|5.5|90|1.40|
|2002|1,851,758|4.1|94|1.45|
|2003|1,915,030|3.4|97|1.50|
|2004|1,973,747|3.1|100|1.55|

Sources: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

30
**Table 8: Number of registered foreigners by sending region (as of the end of the year)**

|||||||**2004**||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Region**|**2000**|**2001**|**2002**|**2003**<br>||**Share (%)**|**Percentage change**<br>**from the end of the**<br>**previous year (%)**|
|**Total**|1,686,444|1,778,462|1,851,758|1,915,030|1,973,747|100.0|3.1|
|**Asia**|1,244,629|1,311,449|1,371,171|1,422,979|1,464,360|74.2|2.9|
|**South America**|312,921|329,510|334,602|343,635|358,211|18.2|4.2|
|**North America**|58,100|60,492|63,201|63,271|64,471|3.3|1.9|
|**Europe**|47,730|51,497|55,288|57,163|58,429|3.0|2.2|
|**Oceania**|12,839|14,697|15,898|16,076|16,131|0.8|0.3|
|**Africa**|8,214|8,876|9,694|10,060|10,319|0.5|2.6|
|**Stateless**|2,011|1,941|1,904|1,846|1,826|0.1|-1.1|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

31
|**Table 9: FOREIGN**|**WORKERS IN JAPAN (2002)**<br>4156|
|---|---|
|Legal foreignworkers|3,3|
|Skilled workers|(179,639)|
|Migrant workers of Japanese origin|(233,897)|
|Illegal foreign workers|220,552|
|Total|634,088|
|**Total Labor Force InJapan **|**66,490,000**|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Labor.

**Table 10: Illegal Foreign Workers Apprehended, by Country of Origin (2004)**

||<br>|Number<br>|<br>|<br>|Shar<br>|e(%)<br>|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||Total|Male|Female|Total|Male|Female|
|Total|55,351|31,100|24,251|100.0|56.2|43.8|
|China|15,702|9,536|6,166|100.0|60.7|39.3|
|Taiwan (China)|503|156|347|100.0|31.0|69.0|
|Hong Kong|66|37|29|100.0|56.1|43.9|
|Philippines|8,558|2,975|5,583|100.0|34.8|65.2|
|Korea|7,782|2,781|5,001|100.0|35.7|64.3|
|Thailand|3,572|1,384|2,188|100.0|38.7|61.3|
|Indonesia|2,103|1,463|640|100.0|69.6|30.4|
|Malaysia|1,575|1,141|434|100.0|72.4|27.6|
|Myanmar|1,466|1,179|287|100.0|80.4|19.6|
|Brazil|1,338|833|505|100.0|62.3|37.7|
|Bangladesh|1,312|1,215|97|100.0|92.6|7.4|
|Peru|1,292|775|517|100.0|60.0|40.0|
|Other|10,082|7,625|2,457|100.0|75.6|24.4|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice 32
**Table 11: Illegal Foreign Workers Apprehended, by Activities (2004)**

|||Number|Share(%)|
|---|---|---|---|
|Male|Total|25,348|100.0|
||Factory worker|7,401|29.2|
||Construction worker*|6,185|24.4|
||Cook*|2,591|10.2|
||Unskilled help*|2,185|8.6|
||Bartender *|1,401|5.5|
||Dish washer*|1,112|4.4|
||Other|4,473|17.6|
||(Nontraded)|13,474|53.2|
|Female|Total|17,710|100.0|
||Bar hostess*|6,368|36.0|
||Factory worker|3,038|17.2|
||Waitress*|2,070|11.7|
||Other service*|1,670|9.4|
||Cook*|1,001|5.7|
||Dishwasher*|973|5.5|
||Other|2,590|14.6|
||(Nontraded)|12,082|68.2|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice Note: "Nontraded" is the summation of activities with an asterisk (*).

33
**Table 12: Number of foreign resident with "long term resident" visa (as of the end of the year)**

|||||||**2004**|**Percentage**<br>**chane from the**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Nationality (place of birth)**|**2000**|**2001**|**2002**|**2003**||**Composition**<br>**ratio (%)**|**g**<br>**end of the**<br>**previous year**<br>**(%)**|
|**Total**|237,607|244,460|243,451|245,147|250,734|100.0|2.3|
|**Brazil**|137,649|142,082|139,826|140,552|144,407|57.6|2.7|
|**China**|37,337|36,580|35,020|33,292|32,130|12.8|-3.5|
|**Philippines**|13,285|15,530|18,246|21,117|23,756|9.5|12.5|
|**Peru**|21,369|22,047|21,538|21,045|20,779|8.3|-1.3|
|**South Korea / Korea**|9,509|9,243|9,091|8,941|8,751|3.5|-2.1|
|**Others**|18,458|18,978|19,730|20,200|20,911|8.3|3.5|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

34
# **Table 13: Entry of Brazilians to Japan**

|Year|Total|First comer|Repeater|
|---|---|---|---|
|<br>Number|||<br>|
|1999|70,794|38,275|32,519|
|2000|101,513|58,577|42,936|
|2001|81,800|39,533|42,267|
|2002|71,763|33,296|38,467|
|2003|79,692|41,101|38,591|
|<br>Share (%)|||<br>|
|1999|100.0|54.1|45.9|
|2000|100.0|57.7|42.3|
|2001|100.0|48.3|51.7|
|2002|100.0|46.4|53.6|
|2003|100.0|51.6|48.4|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

35
**Table 14: Number of the permanent residents by nationality** **<u>(as of the end of the year)</u>**

|**Nationality**<br>**(place of birth)**|<br>**2000**|**2001**|**2002**|**2003**|**2004**|**Composition ratio**<br>**(%)**|**Percentage change**<br>**from the end of the**<br>**previous year (%)**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Permanent resident**|657,605|684,853|713,775|742,963|778,583|100.0|4.8|
|**General permanent resident**|145,336|184,071|223,875|267,011|312,964|40.2|17.2|
|**China**|48,809|58,778|70,599|83,321|96,647|12.4|16.0|
|**Brazil**|9,062|20,277|31,203|41,771|52,581|6.8|25.9|
|**Philippines**|20,933|26,967|32,796|39,733|47,407|6.1|19.3|
|**South Korea / Korea**|31,955|34,624|37,121|39,807|42,960|5.5|7.9|
|**Peru**|7,496|11,059|13,975|17,213|20,401|2.6|18.5|
|**Others**|27,081|32,366|38,181|45,166|52,968|6.8|17.3|
|**Special permanent resident**|512,269|500,782|489,900|475,952|465,619|59.8|-2.2|
|**South Korea / Korea**|507,429|495,986|485,180|471,756|461,460|59.3|-2.2|
|**China**|4,151|4,060|3,924|3,406|3,306|0.4|-2.9|
|**Others**|689|736|796|790|853|0.1|8.0|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

36
# **Table 15: The number of foreign residents by age and gender (Brazilian) (A) End of 1992**

|Age|Brazil|Composition<br>ratio|Male|Composition<br>ratio|Female|Composition<br>ratio|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Total|147,803|100.0%|87,679|59.3%|60,124|40.7%|
|0-4year|5,082|3.4%|2,541|2.9%|2,541|4.2%|
|5-14year|7,244|4.9%|3,682|4.2%|3,562|5.9%|
|15-19year|12,997|8.8%|7,550|8.6%|5,447|9.1%|
|20-64year|122,269|82.7%|73,760|84.1%|48,509|80.7%|
|over 65years of age|211|0.1%|146|0.2%|65|0.1%|

|**(B) End of 2002**|
|---|

|Age|Brazil|Composition<br>ratio|Male|Composition<br>ratio|Female|Composition<br>ratio|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Total|268,332|100.0%|147,322|54.9%|121,010|45.1%|
|0-4year|17,264|6.4%|8,852|6.0%|8,412|7.0%|
|5-14year|23,610|8.8%|12,035|8.2%|11,575|9.6%|
|15-19year|16,106|6.0%|8,397|5.7%|7,709|6.4%|
|20-64year|209,702|78.2%|117,214|79.6%|92,488|76.4%|
|over 65years of age|1,650|0.60%|824|0.6%|826|0.7%|

Source: "Foreign residents statistics" from Japanese Ministry of Justice.

37
**Table 16: Number of foreign residents in municipalities where foreign residents concentrate to live**

||Total population|The number of<br>foreign resident|The number of<br>Brazilian<br>resident|The proportion of<br>Brazilian in total<br>population|
|---|---|---|---|---|
|Ota City,Gunma|149,599|7,203|3,390|2.3%|
|Oizumi Town, Gunma|41,284|6,166|4,704|11.4%|
|Iida City, Nagano|109,434|2,873|1,380|1.3%|
|Hamamatsu City, Shizuoka|596,988|21,434|12,712|2.1%|
|Iwata City, Shizuoka|90,128|4,392|3,301|3.7%|
|Kosai City, Shizuoka|44,601|2,549|1,818|4.1%|
|Fuji City, Shizuoka|242,392|4,494|1,850|0.8%|
|Toyohashi City, Aichi|372,986|15,417|9,655|2.6%|
|Toyota City, Aichi|344,549|11,381|6,251|1.8%|
|Ogaki City, Gifu|154,048|5,397|3,432|2.2%|
|Kani City, Gifu|96,203|3,854|3,015|3.1%|
|Minokamo City, Gifu|50,820|3,373|2,438|4.8%|
|Yokkaichi City, Mie|289,797|7,234|3,127|1.1%|
|Suzuka City, Mie|187,425|7,046|3,851|2.1%|
|Ueno City, Mie|59,626|3,041|1,999|3.4%|
|Total|2,829,880|105,854|62,923|2.2%|
|(National Data, whole Japan)|126,688,364|1,851,758|268,332|0.2%|

Source: The data from each municipality.

38
# **Table 17: The employment situation of non-Japanese and** **_Nikkeijin_ from Latin America (as of June 1, 2003)**

||non-Japanese who<br>come from Latin||(Of those)_Nikkeijin_<br>from Latin America||
|---|---|---|---|---|
||America|Composition ratio||Composition ratio|
|The total number of direct labor|61,172|100.0%|55,193|100.0%|
|<br>(by industry)|<br>|<br>||<br>|
|Manufacturing industry|51,980|85.0%|47,444|86.0%|
|Service sector|4,524|7.4%|3,708|6.7%|
|Wholesale and retail trade|669|1.1%|571|1.0%|
|Restaurant, lodging industry|271|0.4%|205|0.4%|
|Instruction, learning assistance service|189|0.3%|80|0.1%|
|Others<br>|3,539<br>|5.8%<br>|3,185|5.8%<br>|
|The labor who takes up employment with a business establishment<br>which primarily performing labor dispatch or contracting business|38,542|63.0%|35,469|64.3%|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare.

39
**Table 18: The foreign household's occupancy status of the public housing in municipalities where foreign residents concentrate to live (the end of March, 2002)**

||The total number of households|The number of foreign<br>households|The proportion of foreign<br>households|
|---|---|---|---|
|Ota City,Gunma|3,505|355|10.1%|
|Oizumi Town, Gunma|698|96|13.8%|
|Iida City, Nagano|1,103|145|13.1%|
|Hamamatsu City, Shizuoka|7,413|951|12.8%|
|Iwata City, Shizuoka|623|116|18.6%|
|Kosai City, Shizuoka|516|146|28.3%|
|Fuji City, Shizuoka|2,765|183|6.6%|
|Toyohashi City, Aichi|6,694|1,159|17.3%|
|Toyota City, Aichi|7,176|1,450|20.2%|
|Ogaki City, Gifu|1,197|27|2.3%|
|Kani City, Gifu|227|4|1.8%|
|Minokamo City, Gifu|266|26|9.8%|
|Yokkaichi City, Mie|5,639|670|11.9%|
|Suzuka City, Mie|2,084|129|6.2%|
|Total|39,906|5,457|13.7%|

Source: Gaikokujin Shuju Toshi Kaigi (Congress of Major Cities where Foreign Residents Concentrated to Live).

40
Tabel 19 The current state of school attendance in the cities where foreign residents concentrate to live

*The current state of school attendance of foreign residents ready for school (2002)

||School age<br>foreign<br>resident|The number of<br>school<br>attendance|The enrollment<br>in foreign<br>school|The number of<br>school non-<br>attendance|Rate of school<br>non-attendance|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Ota City,Gunma|502|233|91|178|35.5%|
|Oizumi Town,Gunma|646|313|109|224|34.7%|
|Iida City,Nagano|195|149|0|46|23.6%|
|Hamamatsu City,Shizuoka|1,556|873|358|325|20.9%|
|Iwata City,Shizuoka|270|118|91|61|22.6%|
|Kosai City,Shizuoka|169|116|unknown|58|34.3%|
|Fuji City,Shizuoka|274|191|0|83|30.3%|
|Toyohashi City,Aichi|1,100|644|250|206|18.7%|
|Toyota City,Aichi|819|431|236|75|9.1%|
|Ogaki City,Gifu|364|212|unknown|152|41.8%|
|Kani City,Gifu|258|91|74|93|36.0%|
|Minokamo City,Gifu|238|110|74|54|22.7%|
|Yokkaichi City,Mie|461|274|109|78|16.9%|
|Suzuka City,Mie|497|167|50|280|56.3%|
|Total|7,349|3,922|1,442|1,913|26.0%|

Sources:Gaikokujin Shuju Toshi Kaigi (Congress of Major Cities where Foreign Residents Concentrate to Live) 41
**Table 20: Criminal Offences by Brazilians and Peruvians**

||1992|1998|1999|2000|2001|2002|increasing rate|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|The number of foreign resident|1,281,644|1,512,116|1,556,113|1,686,444|1,778,462|1,851,758|4.1%|
|Brazilian|147,803|222,217|224,299|254,394|265,962|268,332|0.9%|
|Peruvian|31,051|41,317|42,773|46,171|50,052|51,772|3.4%|
|Number of Offence|12,153|31,779|34,398|30,971|27,763|34,746|25.2%|
|Number of Criminal Offence|7,457|21,689|25,135|22,947|18,199|24,258|33.3%|
|Brazilian|222|3,278|5,110|3,273|3,457|4,967|43.7%|
|Peruvian|331|1,023|1,250|482|425|436|2.6%|

Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

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Figure 1: Real GDP of Japan <!-- Start of picture text --> 600<br>500<br>400<br>300<br>200<br>100<br>0<br>year<br>trillion yen (1990 price)<br>1930 1935 1940 1944 1946 1948 1950 1952 1954 1956 1958 1960 1962 1964 1966 1968 1970 1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002<br><!-- End of picture text --> Source: Japanese Prime Minister’s Office.

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# **Figure 2: Illegal Foreign Workers Apprehended**

<!-- Start of picture text --> 70000<br>60000<br>50000<br>40000<br> Female<br> Male<br>30000<br>20000<br>10000<br>0<br>1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004<br><!-- End of picture text --> Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

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# **Figure 3: Migrant Workers of Japanese Origin**

<!-- Start of picture text --> 300,000<br>250,000<br>200,000<br>150,000<br>100,000<br>50,000<br>0<br>1988 1989 1990 1991 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004<br><!-- End of picture text --> Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

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Figure 4: The Number of Brazilians Staying in Japan <!-- Start of picture text --> 350<br>300<br>250<br>200<br>150<br>100<br>50<br>0<br>1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004<br>year<br>(thousand)<br><!-- End of picture text --> Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

Figure 5: Nikkeijin's Length of Stay in Japan <!-- Start of picture text --> no answer less than 1 year<br>1% 5%<br>1-3 years<br>more than 10 years 16%<br>28%<br>3-5 years<br>13%<br>5-10 years<br>37%<br><!-- End of picture text --> Note: The data for 2002. Source: Sangyo Koyo Antei Sentah (Industry Employment Security Center).

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# Figure 6: Brazilian by Visa Categories

<!-- Start of picture text --> Other<br>Permanent resident<br>Long term resident<br>Spouse of Japanese<br><!-- End of picture text --> Note: The data for 2002. Source: Japanese Ministry of Justice.

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# **APPENDIX I: Chronology of the Japanese Emigration**

|1868|Meiji Restoration<br>About 500 Japanese immigrants arrived in Hawaii.<br>About 40 Japanese immigrants arrived in Guam.|
|---|---|
|1869|<br>About 40 Japanese immigrants arrived in California.|
|1885|Official migration agreement was concluded between the governments of Japan<br>and Hawaii.|
||First “official” immigrants from Japan arrived in Hawaii (943 people)|
|1888|Emancipation of slaves in Brazil|
|1894|“Migrants Protection Regulation (Imin Hogo Kisoku)” was issued by the Japanese<br>government charging private migration companies with recruiting and sending<br>emigrants.|
|1895|<br>Diplomatic relations were opened between Japan and Brazil|
|1899|Japanese bonded workers arrived in Peru (790 people)|
|1903|Japanese bonded workers arrived in the Philippines (about 3,000 people)|
|1907|<br>A Japan-U.S. Gentlemen’s Agreement was signed, which severely restricted<br>Japanese immigration to the United States|
|1908|“Kasado-maru”, which carried 791 Japanese immigrants, arrived in the port of<br>Santos, Brazil. Almost all of these immigrants were bonded workers on coffee<br>plantations.|
|1909|<br>Five Japanese families owned the land in Brazil. They started the cultivation of<br>cotton.|
|1910|Japan annexed Korea. The rush of Japanese migration to Korea started.|
|1914|The number of Japanese immigrants to Brazil exceeded ten thousands.|
||The state government of São Paulo announced termination of immigration<br>contract with Japanese migration companies.<br>The World War I broke out.|
||The direct immigration from Japan to Argentina began.|
|1915|<br>Japanese colony plantations were opened, the most famous being “Hirano Colony<br>Plantation.”|
||The first Japanese school was opened in São Paulo (Taisho School)|
|1916|<br>The first Japanese language newspaper was issued in Brazil.|
|1921|The state government of São Paulo announced termination of travel subsidies to<br>Japanese immigrants.|
|1924|<br>The United States enacted the law which prohibited the new immigration from<br>|
||Japan. As a result, the immigration to Latin America was boosted.|
|1925|<br>The Japanese government began travel subsidies to Japanese immigrants to Brazil.<br>It was the start of the government sponsored immigration to Brazil.|
|1926|<br>The Japanese governments loaned 850,000 yen, with very low interest rate, to<br>Japanese coffee farmers in Brazil.|
|1927|<br>“Overseas Immigration Union Law (Kaigai Iju Kumiai Ho)” was enacted. The<br>purpose of the law was to promote Japanese colony plantations.|
|1928|Japanese immigration to Canada was severely restricted by the Canadian<br>government.|

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|1929|“The Ministry of Immigration (Takumu sho)” was created, with the mission to<br>promote and direct Japanese emigration.|
|---|---|
||The Great Depression. The price of coffee plunged.|
|1931|The Manchurian Incident broke out.|
|1932|Manchuria became an “independent state.” The flood of Japanese immigration to<br>Manchuria started (until the end of the World War II in 1945)<br>The Japanese government greatly increased travel subsidies to Japanese<br>immigrants to Brazil.|
|1934|<br>“Two percent clause” was added to the Brazilian Constitution. The clause<br>limited the number of annual inflow of immigrants from each country to two<br>percent of total immigration from each country in the last 50 years. This<br>resulted in a severe reduction of Japanese immigration to Brazil.|
|1936|<br>“The 2.26 Incident” occurred in Japan. (About 1400 military personnel attempted<br>coup d’etat on February 26. Many politicians, including the Minister of Finance,<br>were assassinated. Although the coup attempt failed, the military authorities took<br>control of the Japanese government since then.|
||Cotton plantations managed by Japanese immigrants increased substantially.|
|1937|<br>Japanese language education for students under 14 years old was prohibited in<br>Brazil.|
|1938|The Brazilian new immigration law was enacted, which severely restricted<br>Japanese immigrants’ rights.|
||Japanese (also German and Italian) language schools were forced to close in Brazil.<br>Japanese short-wave radio broadcast to overseas began.|
|1939|<br>Many Japanese immigrants returned to Japan.<br>The World War II broke out.|
|1941|Japanese language newspapers were prohibited in Brazil.<br>The Pacific War (Japan-U.S. War) broke out.|
|1942|<br>Brazil cut diplomatic relations with Germany, Italy and Japan.<br>Various oppression measures were imposed on Japanese immigrants in Brazil.|
|1945|Brazil declared war to Japan (in June)<br>Atomic bombs were dropped to Hiroshima and Nagasaki (in August)<br>|
||Japan surrendered to the Allied Forces (in August)|
|1946|Terrorist attacks by “Kachi-Gumi (non-believer of Japanese defeat)” on<br>“Make-Gumi (believer of Japanese defeat) increased.|
|1947|“Return home scam” victims increased among Japanese immigrants in Brazil.|
|1950|About 50 members of the right-wing fraud syndicate “Kokumin Zenei Tai<br>”|
||(National Vangurd) were arrested in São Paulo.|
|1951|<br>The first Japanese ship (Kobe-Maru) after the W.W.II arrived in the port of Santos.|
|1951|<br>Mr. Tamaru became the first_Nikkeijin_parliament member of the State of São Paulo.|
|1952|The Brazilian government approved resumption of Japanese immigration.|
|1953|The first Japanese immigrants after the WWII arrived in Santos.|
|1955|<br>The Emigration Department was established in the Japanese Ministry of<br>Foreign Affairs. The mission of the department was to promote Japanese<br>emigration to the Americas.|
|1956|The first group of Japanese immigrants arrived in Dominican Republic.|

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|1957|The foreign direct investment of the Japanese firms to Brazil increased.|
|---|---|
|1959|Japanese Prime Minister Kishi visited Brazil and Argentina.|
|1961|Prime Minister Ikeda in Japan announced the “income doubling plan”, which<br>initiated miraculous economic growth in Japan.|
|1961|Pan-American Airlines began scheduled service between Japan and Brazil, which<br>connected the two countries in 40 hours.|
||About 600 Japanese immigrants to Dominican Republic returned home, and<br>reported their terrible immigration experiences.|
|1960s|Emigration boom subsided in Japan due to the Japanese economic success.|
|1988|Return migration of_Nikkeijin_workers increased.|
|1990|The Japanese immigration law was revised, allowing the second and third<br>generations of the Japanese emigrants to come and work in Japan.|
|1990s|The number of_Nikkeijin_workers in Japan dramatically increased.|

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# **APPENDIX II: Methodology of the Surveys Cited in the Paper**

In section IV of the paper, I quoted three surveys on remittances by _Nikkeijin_ . Brief summary of methodology of the three surveys are as follows:

# **1. 1993 survey by Japan Institute of Labor**

- (1) Sample: _Nikkeijin_ living in Brazil

- (2) Number of questionnaires distributed: 500

(3) Number of interviews: 376 (of which 202 (53.7%) had an experience of working in Japan)

- (4) Date of interviews: September 1993

# **2. 1998 Survey by Japan Institute of Labor**

- (1) Sample: _Nikkeijin_ living in Brazil

- (2) Number of questionnaires distributed: 300

(3) Number of interviews: 205 (of which 106 (51.7%) had an experience of working in Japan)

- (4) Date of interviews: September 1998

# **3. 2005 Survey commissioned by the Inter-American Bank**

(1) Sample: Latin American immigrant adults living in Japan (2) Number of Interview: 1,070 interviews (3) Language of Interviews: Portuguese, Spanish and Japanese (4) Date of interviews: February 2005 51