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the department for Enterprise
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encouraging them to visit the market, keep in touch and draw their own conclusions. Preliminary findings from the three year Opportunity Japan Campaign, which is now about to finish, show that 28% of companies now see Japan as their first or second largest export market as compared with 13% five Years ago and This still that 62% see Japan as a considerable opportunity. leaves a considerable gap in awareness which we intend to reduce still further through a follow up three year campaign which I will be launching in April, with the aim of heightening understanding of the opportunities for doing business with the Japanese worldwide. My Department is also undertaking a complementary campaign to encourage senior engineers and technologists in companies to visit Japan and keep in close touch with developments there.
It was clear from my visit that, in addition to its obvious commercial benefits, this sort of positive approach significantly improves our credibility with the Japanese as a serious economic partner whose views repay attention.
The timing was, of course, particularly good for setting out our views on the Gulf crisis and pressing the case for an appropriate Japanese contribution to our costs. The signs of possible movement on that front show, like the progress in commercial relations, that persistent and well focused pressure, in support of policies which are self-evidently in our mutual interest, can be effective in beginning to move the Japanese government from a total preoccupation with domestic pressures and managing the relationship with the United States. If those two preoccupations are not to be paramount, we will need to continue to be seen to be giving attention to developing the government and business
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