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Number of foreign workers at Japanese companies hits record high: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare

March 15, 2007
By Ken Worsley


On Monday, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare released a report stating that as of June 1, 2006, the number of foreigners employed directly by Japanese companies had reached a record 222,929. This number was up by 24,549 (12.37%) from the previous year. 27,323 companies reported employing foreign workers, up by 2,217 (8.83%) from last year.

Click on the image on the right to view a chart showing the increase in the number of foreign workers (employed directly by Japanese firms) in Japan over the past ten years.

Of these workers, 45% were from East Asian countries, 29.1% from Central and South America, 14.5% from Southeast Asia, 4.2% from North America, 3.3% from Europe and 3.9% from other parts of the world. Of the workers from Central and South America, 90.6% were identified as 日系人 (nikkeijin), or non-Japanese of Japanese descent.

In terms of industry, 52.5% of the workers were employed at automakers, appliance makers and other manufacturers. 40.12% of the workers were listed as having lived in Tokyo, Aichi and Shizuoka.

One other statistic that might be of note: the percentage of foreign workers in Japan who are women has increased each year since 1997. Ten years ago, the balance was 64.6% men and 35.4% women; in 2006 the gap had narrowed to 53.5% male and 46.4% female.

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Comments

3 Responses to “Number of foreign workers at Japanese companies hits record high: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare”

  1. John S on March 15th, 2007 6:38 pm

    Interesting that the number of women coming to Japan to work is increasing so much, but I guess it makes sense from the corporate point of view, with women’s wages in Japan being what…44% that of men?

    I heard that the govenrment has put the clamp down on the number of nikkei workers allowed in. Any data on that?

  2. Ken Worsley on March 15th, 2007 8:21 pm

    Ok, just worked that up into a post. Happy?

  3. hadi on July 27th, 2008 6:41 pm

    hi,
    i am from iran. i need to job in japan, please help me and answer to my email.
    thank you

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