Japan saw its biggest year-on-year jump in foreign workers since records began, government data showed Friday, as the country seeks to address labor shortages exacerbated by its aging population.
In October 2024, the nation's foreign workforce stood at 2.3 million -- an increase of around 254,000 people from a year earlier, labour ministry data showed.
That marks the biggest jump since records began in 2008, and is the latest in a series of annual record-breaking increases.
The total has jumped around threefold from a decade ago, in 2014, when the number of foreign workers stood at 788,000.
Japan has the world's second-oldest population after Monaco, according to the World Bank, and its relatively strict immigration rules mean it faces growing labor shortages.
Friday's data showed Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipinos were the top three nationalities in Japan's foreign labor force.
Among the most common jobs held by foreign workers were positions in the manufacturing, hospitality, and retail sectors.
A "technical intern" program continued to account for a sizable portion of the foreign workforce, at 20.4 percent.
The state-sponsored scheme is ostensibly an attempt by Japan to give participants from countries such as China and Vietnam specialised experience to use in their home countries.
But critics have long called it a "backdoor" source of foreign labor in a conservative nation loath to officially acknowledge it is open to immigrants.
The intern program has also been long dogged by allegations of discrimination and physical abuse.
© 2025 AFP
17 Comments
Login to comment
Mr Kipling
LOL.... the very next story on JT..
Yet another Vietnamese stabbing. Wake up Japan!
リッチ
20% are basically slave labor. Let’s call it as it is. Cheap 3rd world labor. Disgusting.
Yotomaya
@Mr Kipling
Because there are never any reports of Japanese people committing crimes.
If anything, a Vietnamese person is much more likely to be on the receiving end of illegal working conditions and workplace harassment than commit crimes themselves.
Mr Kipling
in Japan?
They are paid exactly the same rate as any Japanese worker.
Mr Kipling
The conditions are so bad that thousands are competing to come to Japan. Odd don't you think?
kurisupisu
@Mr Kipling
Your belief on the equality of foreign workers is based on what?
The Japanese Constitution?
Unfortunately, there are many examples of foreigners being deceived and abused in Japan.
Even JT has had many examples of ill treatment.
GuruMick
1/ White western people making claims about " foreigners " nothing new.
2/What is new is these same privileged people making the claims while themselves being a foreigner in another country .
3/Racism can be partially hidden, or completely on show, even as something to chest beat about.
But it is still racism.
4/ Today I was served by a non Japanese man in a 7/11.....the horror...the horror...
Meiyouwenti
“Friday's data showed Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipinos were the top three nationalities in Japan's foreign labor force.”
i wonder how it is that a growing number of people from the world’s second largest economy, China, are coming to Japan, the world’s fourth largest, to work at minimal wage jobs, or worse, as technical trainees.
Robotron
You don't save Japan by turning it into India or the Philippines. Give a reason for people to have families. The majority of the ones who care about depopulation and opening the doors to immigration are the ones who want to maintain the lowest salary possible while recording record profits.
Yotomaya
In JT, mostly yes.
The "trainee programme" has such a bad reputation for worker exploitation that even the LDP had to get along with reform (i.e. renaming).
@GuruMick
Very well put!
sakurasuki
@Mr Kipling
Wrong, JGovt use trainee/intern scheme so Japanese company who use those foreign worker can pay wages lower than normal regional wages. Despite the fact in order to apply those program they need to have previous experience in similar field prior coming to Japan, so is not training at all, it is actual labor.
https://www.reuters.com/article/world/special-report-foreign-interns-pay-the-price-for-japan-s-labor-shortage-idUSKBN0EN06G/
https://sp.m.jiji.com/english/show/4002
sakurasuki
@Mr Kipling
Because many of them have no idea about their condition before coming to Japan, those agents that recruit them in their home country basically they are salesman that try to convince by selling good living in Japan. All those agents need to do just get them into Japan and sign contracts.
Some critics even compared that Japanese scheme equal to human trafficking
https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14675668
https://www.business-humanrights.org/ja/%E6%9C%80%E6%96%B0%E3%83%8B%E3%83%A5%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B9/japans-trainee-programme-human-trafficking-lawyer-japan/
sakurasuki
@リッチ
They the one who really keep Japanese economy going basically, however JGovt doesn't want them to stay in Japan that long. JGovt just want them to get those worker during productive ages.
https://eiglaw.com/japan-training-employment-program/
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Japan-immigration/Japan-to-overhaul-troubled-foreign-trainee-program-3-things-to-know
sakurasuki
By 2040 Japan need 6.7 Million foreign workers, not ordinary workers, workers that willing to be paid low wages.
Mr Kipling
LOL.... Right, none of them have friends or relatives that have been to Japan, None of them have access to the internet, none of them talk to each other..
They all know they will be doing the (banned word) jobs that Japanese don't want to do for the salary offered.
They all know that even that (banned word) salary is at least 4 times more than they can get at home.
There are instances of worker exploitation just as there is for Japanese workers.
factchecker
as the country seeks to address labor shortages exacerbated by its aging population.
Wrong. Pay a decent wage, Japanese will do the jobs.
Abe234
Well I am sorry but this is only going to accelerate as the demographics change and the highly educated high school kids go to university and don't want to do certain jobs. Here is a fact, the workers that are coming, are they ALL university graduates? Are they all coming here because they love Japan or because they can earn more even at rubbish jobs? If you have highly educated kids graduating high school, they don't want a career in serving food or working at a cafe or little shop.( some might for whatever reason) but, someone has to serve that drink, and food, and do the job nobody else wants. The idea that we are "bringing in highly skilled workers" isn't the whole truth. Yes.We are bringing the highly skilled in, but we are also bringing in the immigrants to do jobs the highly educated DO NOT WANT TO DO. We may not like that scenario but we need those workers, and the government needs the tax revenue as they work, and become consumers in Japan.
The highly educated trope is said by all politicians to make the general public feel good about immigration,(every country wants WORLD CLASS DOCTORS and engineers), but there is no way a politician would get re-elected if he said "We need more waiters, cleaners, cooks and dishwashers". I think it is a result of a highly educated workforce. The work may be seen as beneath them until they are unemployed.
As for those who break the law. A one-way ticket out is the best way.