Liaison council for international internship
The Kansai Bureau of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI-Kansai) will inaugurate on January 30 the International Internship Promotion Liaison Council to promote the public understanding of international internship conducted by companies in the Kansai region and to offer opportunities of exchanges between Kansai companies and foreign students studying in the region. Universities as well as administrative and economic organizations in Kansai are expected to participate in the council, which will be the first Japanese model case of regional activities promoting international internship.There are some 78,000 foreign students in Japan, of whom some 14,000 are studying in universities and other educational institutions in Kansai. The METI-Kansai has been studying ways to promote the internship of foreign students because acceptance of foreign students as interns will help companies globalize and activate their businesses and expand overseas in the future.
The council will sponsor meetings where foreign students can meet officials of Kansai companies, hold seminars and symposiums and provide foreign students with information on Kansai. Among those expected to join the council are 23 organizations including Kyoto University, the Osaka Regional Immigration Bureau, the Kansai Economic Federation and the Center for Domestic and Foreign Students.
Kansai forum on Islamic culture in U.S.
The Kansai American Center of the U.S. Consulate General in Osaka-Kobe will hold a forum on Islam and Islamic culture in the U.S. on January 23. The forum, to take place at the Osaka consulate under co-sponsorship with the Osaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Kansai Economic Federation, will discuss Islam's impact on the economic, political and social situations in the U.S.The event comes at a time when Islam is drawing global attention following the September 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. Japanese interests in Islam are also growing, with a large number of Japanese companies operating in the U.S., which are important business markets for Japan. Accordingly, Japanese involvement in the Islam society in the U.S. is becoming an important issue.
The main speaker at the forum will be Dr. Zahid H. Bukhari, director of the Muslims in American Public Square (MAPS) of Georgetown University. Dr. Bukhari will give a lecture on the historical aspect of Islam in the U.S., including the roles Islam Americans play in U.S. society. After his lecture, the forum will hold discussions on the differences in commercial practices between the U.S. and Japan, as well as the Islam impact on Japan-U.S. business relations.
Osaka Seminar for inviting foreign companies
The Osaka City Office and the World Trade Center Osaka (WTCO) will hold a seminar at the World Trade Center in Minato Ward of Tokyo on January 29 for the purpose of inviting foreign companies to set up shop in Osaka. As representatives of foreign companies that have expanded into Osaka, Akihiko Uetake, vice-president for store operations of Office Depot Japan, Inc., and Daniel R. Jensen, executive vice-president of USJ Co., Ltd., will speak at the seminar, explaining the attractiveness of Osaka from foreign businessmen's viewpoints.The seminar is also expected to outline 1) the subsidies and other support programs the Osaka City Office offers to foreign companies; 2) facilities for supporting foreign companies; 3) the present situation of the development of the Osaka coastal area, and 4) the attractiveness of the Osaka coastal area as investment outlet.
The seminar will be open to the public free of charge.
Nara Pref. to promote Uzbekistan's tourism
The Nara Prefectural Government will launch in February a five-year program to support promotion of tourism in Uzbekistan by conducting on-the-job training of Uzbek tourist officials. Nara was commissioned by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) to conduct the training after JICA was requested by the Uzbek government to train its tourist officials.Nara will accept about 10 Uzbekistan tourist officials each year for on-the-job training that will include visits to tourist spots and exchanges with tourist industry officials and sight-seeing volunteers.
JICA selected Nara as the site of the training as the prefecture has many things in common with Uzbekistan, including various historical sites and other tourist attractions. Nara hopes that the training project will help promote tourism of the two countries.
Fukui City affiliates with Suwon City
Fukui City has concluded an affiliation agreement with South Korea's Suwon City to promote exchanges with Suwon on the administrative level. Exchanges between the two cities have so far been conducted on private-sector levels, with affiliation pacts concluded between the Fukui Junior Chamber and its Suwan counterpart in 1964 and between the Fukui Chamber of Commerce and Industry and its Suwan counterpart in 1983.Full-scale exchanges between the two cities on official levels are expected to start this year, with Suwon sending a delegation to a historical parade and Fukui sending a delegation to Suwon during the 2002 FIFA World Cup TM Korea/Japan.
Korean teachers receiving training on Japanese
Korean teachers of French and German languages who will also teach the Japanese language in Korean high schools starting in 2003 are currently receiving training at the Japan's Foundation's Japanese-Language Institute, Kansai, located in Tajiri Town, Osaka.Korean teachers who are now teaching French or German in high schools will be required to teach Japanese as well from 2003 because of the shortage of teachers of Japanese.
High schools in South Korea will allow students to freely choose the second foreign language starting in 2003. Since Japanese, together with Chinese, is very popular among young Koreans, Korean high schools will have to substantially increase Japanese language classes, and subsequently the number of teachers of Japanese.
With a serious shortage of teachers of Japanese expected to occur in a year or two, the schools find it necessary to let teachers of French and German to teach Japanese and Chinese as well.
The Korean Government has decided to send these teachers to Japan to receive training, with focus on pronunciation, while experiencing Japanese culture first hand. It opened a one-year training program for the Korean teachers in March 2001 to run two years. In cooperation with the project, the Japan Foundation's Japanese-Language Institute receives the first-year trainees, two groups totaling 88 respectively for two weeks (January 7-20, January 21-February 3) at the institute's Kansai International Center.
Kobe promoting multi-language restaurant menu
The Kobe City Office is distributing to foreign tourists multilanguage restaurant menus to make it easier at low-budget restaurants in the town. This is part of the city's campaign to promote international hospitality, with a large number of foreign tourists expected to come to Kobe this year in connection with the 2002 FIFA World Cup TM co-hosted by Japan and South Korea. The menus list popular dishes served at low-budget restaurants in Japanese, English, Chinese (simplified characters and traditional characters) and Korean (Hangul). Examples of how to order dishes are printed on the cover of the menus.
The city office has prepared stickers, which will be posted at restaurants where the multilanguage menus are used. The menus currently distributed list Chinese dishes, rice bowls dishes, noodles and tea drinking.
The city office plans to add Korean dishes and barbecue when the menus are updated. The city office is also expected to seek cooperation from fast food chains and restaurants in preparing the multilanguage menus.
Kansai in Focus: New advanced technology medical research facilities emerging in Kansai
Construction of new facilities for advanced technology medical research is progressing in Kobe City and in SAITO (International Cultural City) being developed in the northern part of Osaka Prefecture.The first of such facilities opening in 2002 is a reproductive medicine research facility that will begin operation in Kobe in the spring. The facility will conduct research on the reproduction of human organs impaired by injuries or illness.
In SAITO, plans are under way to build a research facility that will engage in the development of next-generation basic medical technology such as deciphering of human genomes. Kansai may become the national hub for medical and biological research, if the facility accelerates its cooperation with pharmaceutical companies, which are concentrated in Kansai.
Two high-tech medical facilities are being built on Port Island, a man-made island off Kobe. One is RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology (CDB) of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research which will be basically completed in March. The other is the High-tech Medical Center being built by the Kobe City Office and other organizations in Kansai. The latter facility, which is likely to start activities almost at the same time, will implement clinical research on genetic treatment and other new medical technology. The center, which plans to commercialize results of its research, could become the base for both upper-stream and lower-stream high-tech medical research.
The establishment of these facilities is based on Kobe City's plan to build a Medical Industry City. The plan reflects Kobe's efforts to transform its economic structure, which had been focused on smokestack industries such as steel and shipbuilding, to fashion, foodstuff and information-technology. Lately, Kobe is putting emphasis on the medical industry and striving to develop medical companies in the city.
Kobe's plan is patterned after building research facilities by medical companies in Maryland and other states in America, which are reportedly making contributions to the regional economy. Kobe intends to have the high-tech medical sector lead the regional economy, which has remained stagnant since the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake.
Kobe also hopes to host the Advanced Medical Center for Genomic Research and Development, a facility which will use information on human genomes for the research on side effects of medicines and support clinical tests. Kobe is mentioned as one of locations eligible as its site.
SAITO is a new scientific and cultural metropolis, which is being built by the Osaka Prefectural Government and various organizations in Osaka in a hilly area of northern Osaka, with completion set for fiscal 2003. Osaka University, the Osaka Bioscience Institute, the National Cardiovascular Center and other academic bodies have already chosen SAITO as the sites for their research facilities.
The Osaka Prefectural Government hopes to make SAITO a leading bio-science center of the country. As a nucleus facility, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare plans to build a facility for basic technological research for the development of basic technology for next-generation medical technology. Plans are also afoot to build there a Life Science Park Center, an incubator facility focusing on biomedical ventures. (R)