Japan Expands Migrant Labor Program to Address Labor Shortage
The Japanese government is taking steps to address its growing labor shortage by adding four new job categories to its Type 1 specified skilled worker visa program. This program allows foreign workers to stay in Japan for up to five years without bringing their families.
The new categories include automotive transportation, railways, forestry, and the lumber industry. This expansion is part of a broader migrant labor policy approved by the Cabinet in March 2023, which aims to accept 820,000 workers from overseas over the next five years. This represents a significant increase from the previous five years.
Under the specified skilled worker program, foreign nationals can only work in fields where there is a labor shortage after efforts have been made to secure domestic workers and improve productivity. As of the end of 2022, over 208,000 people were living in Japan under this visa status.
The expected number of incoming workers over the next five years is highest for industrial manufacturing (173,000), followed by food and beverage manufacturing (139,000), nursing care (135,000), construction (80,000), and agriculture (78,000). The number of workers has increased in 10 of the 12 existing work fields since the program's launch in 2019. The two exceptions are building cleaning and the restaurant industry.