Society Aikawa: 8% foreign residents, rubbish issues but no discord

Asahi took a closer look at the social fabric of Aikawa, a small town in Kanagawa, where 8% of the population are foreign residents from South America and SE Asia. Aikawa has an inland industrial park with over 100 companies. Following revisions to the immigration law in 1990 allowing permanent residency, foreigners began to live in the town and work at the industrial park. The workers then brought over their relatives and close friends, boosting the foreign resident population to over 3,500 in 2006.

According to the town, there have been no notable problems between Japanese and foreigners, such as violence or hate speech. Ryosuke Kobayashi of the town's planning and policy department said, "Foreigners have been living in Aikawa for so long, Japanese people think of them as just neighbours."

As of October 2023, the town of Aikawa had approximately 3,300 foreign residents. By country of origin, 697 were from Peru, 473 from Vietnam and 456 from Brazil, with South American and Southeast Asian countries continuing to stand out from the fourth place on. The municipal government is aiming to improve the support services offered to foreign residents through measures such as Spanish and Portuguese interpreters on duty and translation tablets at the ready in 112 languages. In addition to issuing mother and child health handbooks in 10 languages including Spanish, the government has also established a system of dispatching medical interpreters to hospitals when care is sought.

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And while there are no significant issues, few resident foreigners reach out to build new connections with the Japanese.

In numerous cases, the workers' bosses at the business park are also foreign-born, so dialogue takes place in their native language. Viewing Japanese as unnecessary at work, many are not bothering to learn it. At the municipal offices and other situations, some parents rely on their children as interpreters, having picked up Japanese at school. As a result, a great number reportedly live with only their foreign peers, forging their own communities more so than deepening ties with locals.

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One issue, however, was the strict garbage rules:

Luis Poeta, a 57-year-old Argentinian who moved to Japan in 1993 and now works as representative director for South American food store Sabor Latino, said, "Supermarkets, real estate agencies and more are thankfully becoming increasingly accessible for foreign residents." However, he noted the difficulty in following detailed rules for garbage collection and the like, going as far as raising suspicions the complicated rules were brought in to confirm the prejudice that "foreigners don't follow garbage rules." Poeta noted his hope that the town will introduce rules adding consideration of its foreign population.

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