The government said Thursday it plans to regularly release data on the number of foreign nationals working in Japan under a new visa system from April, as part of its efforts to avoid having them concentrate in large cities.
Regional communities face more severe labor crunches than metropolises. To prevent the excessive concentration of foreign workers in Tokyo and other big cities, the Justice Ministry plans to make it publicly known how many foreign people are working under the new system by prefecture and industry once every three months.
The ministry unveiled the plan in a meeting with ruling Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers, who adopted a set of government steps to accept more foreign workers under the revised immigration law that was enacted earlier this month.