It might be too late to think about any gain

The Industrial Training Programme (ITP) of JITCO for quite sometime had come under the scrutiny of the Japanese media for some of its practices that the media in Japan evaluate not in a positive term. But since the ITP, despite its covert colouring of exploitation of cheap labour from the developing countries, still represents the only legalised channel that semi or unskilled labour forces from developing countries can use to get entry into the Japanese labour market, the programme has been able to attract the attention of various Asian nations that have excessive supply of human resources, a situation seen by many as the main cause of the widespread unemployment problem that they face.

The agreement that the government of Bangladesh signed with JITCO during our PM's visit was thus praised in both Bangladesh and Japan as a timely initiative that would help ease the burden of unemployment that Bangladesh is compelled to face. It has also been said by the promoters of the agreement, that the treaty would help Bangladesh attract Japanese investment at a later stage when the returnees of JITCO programmes would create a much needed atmosphere of available workforce in the country familiar with the Japanese language and work-practices.

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Ever since the establishment of JITCO in 1991, the organisation came under criticism both in Japan and overseas for its covert emphasis on keeping the flow of cheap labour supply to various Japanese industries. As the purpose of any training programme is to provide participants with the opportunity of gaining skills that would eventually help them to find work, remuneration or allowances are not supposed to be considered a pressing issue in such matters. This is a loophole that the Japanese companies accepting overseas trainee-workers massively misused in the past, resulting in the criticism of the whole process.

Particularly striking were the cases of Indonesian workers, whose plight in Japan attracted media attention for quite sometime during the recent past. It is alleged that the recruiting agents back in Indonesia and Japanese companies where trainee-workers are supposed to undergo training are the two sides that gained most out of the programme, leaving the poor and helpless workers at their mercy.

The terms and conditions set by JITCO for such training programmes seem to have created the fertile ground for their misuse, and both recruiters and employers were simply too enthusiastic to exploit such an attractive loophole. The Internet website of JITCO mentions that the allowances to be given to the participants of the Industrial Training Programme should be seen as allowances needed for miscellaneous expenses incurred during the programme, not wages in compensation for work. Since the amount of such miscellaneous expenses are decided by the companies accepting trainee-workers and the sending organisations, it is understandable that both parties would be interested more to inflate their own profit as much possible by squeezing the amount being paid to those who provide their own labour.

The Japanese media in the past tried to focus on the plight of foreign trainee-workers from a number of countries by exposing the wrong side of the programme and called on the government to ensure that the process might not set an example of violation of labour laws and labour rights and thus compel Japan to face international criticism. But Japanese officials, however, continued to provide stimulation to the programme as a few more countries including Bangladesh later joined the bandwagon of trainee-workers with the dream of reaping benefit of the situation. But despite such expansion of the programme in recent days, the mood now seems to be all set in Japan for the industrial training programme to come to an abrupt end quite soon.

A Justice Ministry panel in Japan recommended recently various steps that the government needs to take to tackle the problem of Japan's declining population. The panel suggested that visa criteria for foreigners should be changed so that people with specific skill can easily come and work in Japan. The panel has recommended Japanese language proficiency as a condition for long-term visa renewals and proposed the ending of a special visa programme for foreigners of Japanese ancestry. The panel's report released in late May said decisions to allow foreigners to continue working in Japan should be based on their qualifications as well as proficiency of Japanese language skill.

The panel also made a specific suggestion on the issue of trainee-workers. The justice ministry panel suggested that the government should take measures to abolish the "technical training system," which was set up to promote technical transfers to developing countries by allowing foreign workers to experience work in Japan. The panel obviously had taken into consideration various reports in recent years focusing on the abuse of the programme by concerned parties as it has been criticised for providing cheap labour for unscrupulous companies.

The panel did not specify how or when to implement the suggestions it made. Recommendations of the government advisory panels in Japan do carry weight as panels are usually composed of experts and academics highly respected in their own fields. Moreover, it is the government that forms such panels with the prior idea of finding ways to initiate necessary changes. As a result, it seems to be already too late to reap any benefit out of an agreement that Bangladesh government has signed with Japan.