In his policy speech to the Diet earlier this year, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced that the government would double foreign direct investment in Japan in five years to increase employment.
The outstanding balance of foreign direct investment in Japan is only one-sixth that of the country's direct investment overseas. The balance of foreign direct investment in the United States exceeds that of U.S. investment in other countries. In Britain, Germany and France, the inward foreign-investment balance is about half the amount of the outward foreign-investment balance.
As a result, foreign direct investment in Japan accounts for only 1 percent of total employment, compared with about 5 percent in the U.S. and Germany.