Skilled Work Force: Indian going to work in Japan will now receive a special status of ‘Specified Skilled Worker’ as they enter Japan for residential stay and work.  This was announced at a recent cabinet meeting in New Delhi recently. 

This is a step in favour of India’s plans to supply specified skilled workers to various countries worldwide. Towards this, the Centre has been mapping domestic skill training programmes with the requirements of different countries. After a meeting that was presided upon by PM Narendra Modi, a memorandum was decided that states that a joint working group will be set up to follow up on this implementation. 

According to the memorandum, this arrangement will “enhance people-to-people contacts, foster mobility of workers and skilled professionals from India to Japan,” a formal cabinet statement added.

With Japan dealing with an aging population, it is looking at a shortage of 6.44 million people in its labour force by 2030. Tokyo alone will be short 1.33 million workers. The intention of creating this pathway for working force between India is two-fold- legal movement of skilled workers takes care of such shortages and also boost India’s remittance economy.

According to a World Bank report, India’s estimated remittance receipt was at $76 billion, a drop of 9% due to the coronavirus pandemic in 2019-2020.

Currently, the Indian government has listed some fourteen sectors that could see a high demand for skilled workers in Japan. These include nursing care; building cleaning; material processing; industrial machinery manufacturing; electric and electronic information related industry; construction; shipbuilding and ship-related industry; automobile maintenance; aviation; lodging; agriculture; fisheries; food and beverages manufacturing; and food service industry.