Ambassador: Japan firms can have confidence in Brazil again
In the same week when Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro exempted the Japanese from visa requirements for tourism and business, Japan’s Ambassador to Brazil Akira Yamada said the number of Japanese executives interested in traveling and getting to know Brazilian initiatives has increased considerably.
He added he was in Japan in February and received dozens of invitations to deliver lectures about the future of the Brazilian economy and investment opportunities. In all of his talks, he focused on details about the most promising fields in Brazilian economy and how the Bolsonaro administration operates.
“Brazil has a lot of potential, and we are friends and partners,” Akira said about the history of cooperation with Japan, which started 110 years ago, when Japanese immigrants first landed in Brazil. Today, the country is home to some 2 million Japanese people or people of Japanese descent in Brazil, the highest amount of Japanese people outside of Japan.
If Brazil is an agricultural power today, this is partly owing to Prodecer, the Development Project of the Cerrado, a cooperation program substantially supported by the Japanese government, with technicians and researchers sent over from Japan to stimulate the cultivation of cereals, especially soybeans, in the Brazilian Cerrado.
Japanese cooperation was also seen in other fields. In sports, judo developed in Brazil after being introduced by Japanese immigrants. Brazilian judokas have bagged a number of medals in the Olympic games and other competitions the world over. The same holds true for Brazilian jujitsu, also brought by Japanese immigrants. Today, Brazilian jujitsu fighters are among the best in the world.
The embassy further stated that, at the request of the Brazilian government and the Brazilian Judo Confederation, Japan is developing a project to send Brazilian judokas to watch judo classes in elementary and high schools in Japan. The goal is to learn the methodology and apply its techniques in Brazilian schools.
