Japan has long been known for its steadfast refusal to submit to the allure of large-scale immigration, as a country that puts social cohesion and societal harmony well ahead of any desire for diversity. Notoriously as hard to get into as Switzerland or Monaco for would be migrants, and even refugees, the ‘yokoso’ (welcome) sign that greets you at Narita Airport is clearly provisional and time limited.

But is all that changing? There are signs of a major shift in policy, from an active dissuasion of foreigners to stay (Japan once paid laid-off Brazilian auto workers to go back home for good after the financial crash) to the door being flung open and a tatami welcome mat being rolled out to the world.

According to government data released in August 2023, the number of foreign nationals in Japan rose 11 per cent from 2022. Foreigners now account for 2.4 per cent of the population (approximately 3 million people). Gearoid Reidy in an article for the Japan Times estimates that the number of overseas workers has more than doubled in the last decade, while the broader foreign community, which includes children and students, has risen by 50 per cent. Reidy envisages a time when more than 10 per cent of Japan’s population will be foreign born, putting the famously homogenous, exclusive, nation on a par with the UK, U.S and France.

This surge has been facilitated by radical changes to visa and work-permit requirements. In June 2023 Prime Minister Fumio Kishida expanded a visa which allowed foreign labourers and their families to stay in Japan indefinitely from just two industries (construction and shipbuilding) to 11. Crucially this now includes the hard to define ‘service sector’ which is probably why it’s rarer to see a Japanese assistant in a convenience store now than a foreign born one. Largely via this pathway the number of Vietnamese is believed to have surged to nearly half a million.

There has also been a focus on highly skilled workers and those in the top income brackets, such as researchers and engineers, and potential entrepreneurs. From April 2023, foreign workers who fulfilled specific criteria became eligible for permanent residency after one year instead of the previous three. Japanese universities have started offering special programmes aimed at luring graduates (‘future creative talent’) from the world’s top 100 universities, who would then be granted special residency status. A ‘start up’ visa for would be tycoons is also available.

The reasons for all this are well-known and can be briefly summarised – Japan has no choice. The plummeting birthrate is hardly unique but coupled with the super ageing society it has focused the minds of policy makers here, particularly in light of sensational predictions from the likes of Elon Musk and Niall Ferguson that on its current demographic trajectory the country could cease to exist within an imaginable timeframe.

According to a 2022 report by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) the country needs at least 7 million foreign workers by 2040 to meet its requirements, most salient among which will be looking after all those old people. The International Monetary Fund has predicted that there will be almost one elderly person for each person of working age by 2060.

All previous attempts to jump start the birth rate or revitalise the economy have failed. In my time in Japan, we have had a series of ambitious, and occasionally rather desperate, initiatives from a succession of hard to remember Prime Ministers, from unlocking Japan’s saving accounts to make the funds available for investment, huge increases in women’s representation in the workforce, flexible working hours, a revolution in English education, and even paying people to move to underpopulated rural areas. None of which have moved the dial.

And so, very quietly, the Japanese government appears to have thrown in the towel. If the native population refuses, despite inducements to innovate, speculate, or indeed relocate and procreate, then people must be imported to perform these important societal functions.

How are the ordinary Japanese taking this? There is some evidence that a majority of Japanese now recognise the need for increased immigration and may even welcome it. A Pew Survey from 2019 found that 59 per cent the same as the US agreed that ‘immigrants make our country stronger’ and in an NHK survey from 2020, 70 per cent agreed with the need to bring in more foreign workers.

However, that latter figure falls to only 57 per cent did so if when people were asked how they would feel if if the increase were to be in their area. And those questions were theoretical, and many may not be fully aware that the theory is now being put into practice.

But the moment of recognition could be fast approaching. And with a residue of Sakoku era insularity certainly lingering in the Japanese psyche (the border closures during Covid were very popular) it remains to be seen whether the Japanese will be as sanguine about the  reality of greatly increased numbers of foreigners, a situation Japan has never experienced, as they appeared to be with its prospect.