Press Releases

Opinion Poll: Image of Japan in Brazil

March 25, 2013

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs commissioned SENSUS, a private surveying agency in Brazil, to conduct an opinion poll on the image of Japan in 24 states in Brazil including 53 cities. Interviews were carried out with 600 citizens aged 16 and over. (The sampling error is plus or minus 4% at a 95% confidence interval.) The main points of its results are as follows.

  1. The Japan-Brazil Relations
    (1) In this survey, 78% of the respondents answered that Japan and Brazil maintained "friendly" or "rather friendly" relations, and 84% expected that the importance of Japan for Brazil will "increase" or "rather increase" in the future.
    (2) A supermajority of respondents (81%) replied that Japanese Brazilians are "contributing" or "rather contributing" to Brazil. Furthermore, 77% of the respondents said that the Brazilians residing in Japan are "contributing" or "rather contributing" to the reinforcement of bilateral relations.
  2. Interest in Japan
    (1) As for which country should be the most important partner of Brazil in the future (multiple answers), Japan (50%) came second after the United States (59%), and was followed by China (32%). On the question of the most favorable country, Japan (9%) ranked fourth after the United States (21%), Portugal (14%) and Italy (10%).
    (2) Regarding the fields in which Brazilians have expectations of Japan (multiple answers), transfer of technology (42%) came first, followed by such areas as the expansion of the import of Brazilian products (39%), increase of employment by factory establishments (38%), investment (21%) and the export of Japanese products (21%).
    (3) As a model country for the installation of technology necessary for the development of Brazil, Japan (40%) replaced the United States (19%) as the top on the list. In addition, as for the most suitable country to study abroad, Japan (11%) was second place, following the United States (43%) and exceeding Britain (9%), France (7%) and Germany (6%).
    (4) Some 75% of the respondents felt intimacy or familiarity with Japan. The reasons behind such affection (multiple answers) included "Japan as an advanced country" (56%), "reliable Japanese products" (30%), "abundance of history and traditional culture" (29%), and "contributions to the development of Brazil" (21%).
    (5) As the fields in which the respondents have particular interest (multiple answers), they cited "science and technology" (53%), followed by "martial arts" (33%), "architecture and Japanese gardens" (32%), "Japanese food" (26%) and "traditional culture" (23%).
    (6) For those who do not feel attached to Japan (23%), the reasons (multiple answers) behind this are "lack of knowledge" (10%), "difference of culture" (7%) and "geographical distance" (7%).
  3. Image about the Japanese and Japanese Brazilians
    (1) The image of the Japanese in Brazil is quite mixed; some respondents regarded the Japanese as "diligent and efficient" (20%), "polite and kind" (10%), "honest" (9%) and "reliable" (8%) while others consider them as "calculating" (17%) and "lacking individuality or being unsociable" (16%).
    (2) About the Japanese Brazilians, however, the positive image was predominant with the following reasons: "diligent and efficient" (17%), "polite and kind" (16%) and "honest with keeping their promises" (16%).
  4. Japan's Commitment to Global Issues
    With regard to Japan's commitment to global issues (multiple answers), Brazilians recognized such areas as "environmental protection" (42%), "sustainable society" (32%) and "support for disaster prevention" (31%).

[Reference]
This is the fourth public opinion poll on the image of Japan in Brazil (last time in January 2008 — https://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/announce/2008/4/1179011_1000.html).


(* The foregoing is a provisional translation. The date indicated above denotes the date of issue of the original press release in Japanese.)
Back to Press Releases