Foreigners Rise In Japan - Report

The number of foreign nationals living in Japan has increased tremendously, with the number of Japanese citizens dropping significantly, according to an official data.

Japan has the world’s second-oldest population after tiny Monaco.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has introduced policies aimed at boosting births, warning the country is “on the verge of whether we can continue to function as a society.”

The government has also been reviewing immigration policies to make moving to Japan more attractive to overseas workers.
According to the data, as of January 1, there were 3.32 million foreign residents in the country.

That marked a surge of 11 per cent on-year and a record high since the Internal Affairs Ministry began logging the data in 2013.
Foreign nationals accounted for around 2.7 per cent of Japan’s total population of 124.9 million.

Japanese media attributed the rise to the end of pandemic-era border controls, which prompted the return of international students and workers taking part in the government’s vocational training scheme.

The number of Japanese citizens residing in Japan, meanwhile, stood at 121.6 million, the data showed, with 2023’s drop of 861,237 the biggest ever recorded and the 15th straight yearly decline.

AFP