THE JAPAN NEWS


 

TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Japanese firms are keeping their eyes peeled for emerging business opportunities in Russia following Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s announcement of an eight-point cooperation plan with Russia in May.

To help realize the plan, Japanese firms are aiming to accelerate investments in resources development and automobile-linked projects, as well as projects to build medical, housing and other infrastructures supporting daily life, which Russian President Vladimir Putin focuses on.

Over 100 business and municipal officials from Japan participated in the two-day Eastern Economic Forum meeting that ended in Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East on Saturday.

During the Russian government-hosted forum, participants introduced about 110 projects involving companies in more than 30 countries, including Japan, China and South Korea. The total size of the projects reached ¥3 trillion, up 60 percent from the total of projects introduced last year.

 

Among Japanese firms, trader Mitsui & Co. plans to build a submarine power cable network linking Sakhalin and Hokkaido, jointly with Russian state-backed major power supplier RusHydro. Automaker Mazda Motor Corp. announced a plan to set up an engine factory in the Far Eastern region.

Hitachi Ltd. is considering providing cutting-edge medical technologies to treat chronic disease sufferers, IHI Corp. is planning to supply sludge treatment equipment using high-performance centrifugal separators and JFE Engineering Corp. is mulling greenhouse plant construction.

Also being considered are large-scale resort facility construction by Iida Group Holdings Co. and joint research on reactor decommission techniques for use at Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc.’s Fukushima No. 1 power plant, the site of an unprecedented triple reactor meltdown in March 2011.

Hoping to achieve a breakthrough in stalled talks over Russian-held four northwestern Pacific islands claimed by Japan, the government is accelerating work to set details of the eight-point plan, led by Hiroshige Seko, minister for economic cooperation with Russia.

Last year, Japan’s exports to Russia plunged 38 percent from the previous year. The balance of Japan’s direct investment in Russia is about one-fifth the level of China, the biggest investor in Russia, mainly because of lower crude oil prices and political risks arising from the Ukrainian crisis.

The government is poised to send a research group to Russia, hoping to obtain stakes in resources development and economic reconstruction projects. Speech