Chapter 2

6. Japan’s Efforts toward Debt Issues

Japan’s perspective on debt relief, methods of disposal of ODA loan debt, etc. has already been discussed in Part II.

Japan’s disbursements for Grant Aid for Debt Relief in fiscal year 2002 amounted to approximately ¥30.3 billion for 16 countries.

7. IT

In the “Okinawa Charter on Global Information Society (IT Charter)” announced at the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit in July 2000, IT is described as one of the most potent forces in shaping the 21^st century. Because IT is an outstanding consumer-led technology, people are aware of the opportunities it affords and it is possible for the international community to achieve further development through the active utilization of IT. For this reason, all people, no matter where they are, should receive the benefits of the global information society and the elimination of the digital divide is an extremely important issue.

Japan announced “Japan’s Comprehensive Co-operation Package to Address the International Digital Divide” at the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit in July 2000. This cooperation policy advances cooperation through non-ODA and ODA official funds expected to be $15 billion over five years.

On the other hand, as expressed in the “IT Charter” mentioned above, the private sector basically plays a leading role in the development of IT. And it is assumed that most of the cooperation policies mentioned above will focus on cooperation through non-ODA such as investment finance, export finance, untied loans, etc. implemented by Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), which supports private sector-based projects. Taking these points into account, Japan is allocating ODA cooperation to cooperation in non-commercial sectors, such as building infrastructure and human resources development in developing countries.

Based on these concepts, Japan is advancing cooperation with the following four pillars expressed in the cooperation policies mentioned above: 1) intellectual contribution to policy and institution-building; 2) human resources development; 3) building IT infrastructure and networking; and 4) promoting the utilization of IT in development assistance.

In order to advance the promotion of the utilization of IT and active formation of IT projects, Japan is strengthening policy dialogue with developing countries, pointing out the importance of IT in Country Assistance Plans, etc. and encouraging an environment in which it is easy to form IT projects.

In March 2003 under the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC), each government office and ministry collaborated to formulate the “Asia Broadband Program.” With this program Japan produced a policy of advancing project formation through promotion of projects utilizing IT, active policy dialogues with each country from Japan, etc. in order to support developing countries and since fiscal year 2003, Japan has been advancing specific measures.

Column 6

Japan-Malaysia High School Student Exchange Program through JICA-Net

The ODA Charter approved by a cabinet decision in August 2003 states the importance of development education with expanded public participation and Japan’s future measures. At the same time, due to the introduction of the “Period for Integrated Study” in schools such as junior high schools and high schools, etc. there are more opportunities to study international themes and development education needs have increased. Against this background, JICA is implementing activities to support development education. Here an exchange program implemented for high school students in Japan and Malaysia is introduced as one example of these activities. In usual exchange programs, teachers and students have to visit each other’s countries but the exchange program implemented on September 7, 2003 between Japanese and Malaysian high school students used JICA’s television conferencing system “JICA-Net” (a new form of international cooperation utilizing a variety of information and communications technologies (ICT) including television conferencing, multi-media teaching materials, the Internet, etc.), enabling the teachers and students to remain in their own countries and exchange information with students in the other country in real time. Teachers, students and guardians from Warabi Prefectural High School in Saitama and SMK Bukit Bintang Boys Secondary School in Malaysia (equivalent to a Japanese junior high and high school) participated in the exchange program and for approximately an hour and a half students and guardians from both schools made presentations and carried out lively exchanges of views in English. As a result, not only did they gain understanding of the differences in their societies and cultures, but also their awareness of development issues was raised. The participants were highly appreciative of this exchange program contributing to development education. In addition, many participants said that “I would like to take the opportunity presented by this exchange program to continue exchange between schools” and the program played a role as a “bridge” connecting the schools. In this fashion, since fiscal year 2002 JICA has begun full-scale use of JICA-Net for distance lectures and seminars, television conferencing, and public participation and development education support projects, etc. as a means to supplement the traditional face-to-face technical cooperation with distance methods and to expand the range of technical cooperation utilizing ICT. Currently JICA-Net Centers are set up in two locations in Japan—Tokyo and Okinawa—and in seven Asian countries. By using international communications lines, it is possible for countries and regions with no specialized JICA-Net Center to connect to the JICA-Net and to date more than 40 countries have done so. Students in Malaysia participating in the exchange program Students in Japan participating in the exchange program