Shimada Talks

Story 1: Synopsis no.1 of Chapter1 "Radical Changes of World Economic Environment and Japan"

This first chapter of my book describes briefly radical changes of world economic environment in which Japanese economy is floating.

Among the issues which recently attract attention of observers of the world economy, problems of EURO zone are particularly visible. Fiscal and financial problems of EURO countries provide dark shadows and worrisome influences to the rest of the world.

After the painful struggles, both economically and politically, of Greece for the last few years in the wake of the discovery of the fake statement of the government fiscal report in the fall of 2009, EURO zone problems seemed at a time have been somewhat stabilized by orchestrated efforts of responsible EU member countries and IMF,and also somewhat successful launch of the new Italian government.

However, this effect was only short-lived. The result of the election of May of French president, and the repeated failure of Greece to organize a new government revived worrisome EURO zone problems again, which were reflected in downward swing of stock prices in stock exchange markets of many countries.

The new French president, M. Francois Hollande, claims that he will not endorse austerity policy package of EURO zone which was architected carefully by his predecessor M. Nicholas Sarkozy and German chancellor Ms. Angela Merkel. M. Hollande advocates that he will bring about economic growth and more employment opportunities. But how could he achieve such a goal is not clear at all particularly in view of the fact that French outstanding government debt is already 68% of GDP, and drastic increase of marginal income tax which will surely discourage the rich and hard working people. The market will surely respond to his self-contradictory economic package in the way of downgrading the French government bond. The political impasse of Greece also gives a bad signal to the market in the sense that Greek will not be able to improve their fiscal conditions. Again the market will react by downgrading Greek bonds further.

The downgrading of government bonds of troubled countries threaten the asset balance of financial organizations of EURO zone and other economies. The deterioration of asset balance will lead to shortage of liquidities and thus to credit crisis, and consequently shrinkage of affected economies and international economy.

The recent experiences of troubled EURO economies such as Greece, Italy, Spain etc provides implicit warning to Japanese fiscal policy. Japan's outstanding government debt amounts to 216% of GDP, much higher than 143% of Greece.

Why, Japan has not been regarded as the case of debt crisis or fiscal crisis? Some observers see that Japan has a much bigger leeway to rebuild fiscal balance since Japan' s consumption tax rate is still only 5% compared with 20~25% range of many EU countries. This means that international financial community thinks that Japan could restore fiscal balance by increasing the consumption tax to an European level if it is needed. This also implies that if Japan could not raise consumption tax rate substantively, then Japanese economy will be seen as a vulnerable case of debt crisis. And this is what drives prime minister Yoshihiko Noda and the ministry of finance to stick stubbornly to an increase of consumption tax rate up to 10% by October 2015.

My New Book

Now, I am happy to be back to my English blog after a long period of absence. During the last several months, I have been concentrating in preparing a new book, which I tentatively entitle, "Prerequisite for Japan's Recovery." It took so much time and energy of myself, I have not been able to turn around to do anything but preparing for this book.

Now that I basically finished preparation and substantive writing of the book, and the manuscript is now at the hand of the publisher, I am and relieved from the burden. And I am tempted to introduce the gist of the book in my English blob as usual. The Japanese book will be published sometime in July. By the time the Japanese book will be out into the market, readers of my English blog will have had some good idea about what is written in my new book.

My basic question underlying this book is whether Japanese economy will be able to recover its desirable state where the potentials of the economy will be reasonably realized to bring fair degree of prosperity to the life of people and to businesses. In my my frank view, Japanese economy is unfortunately declining and deteriorating by the lack of adequate political leadership and by continuous mis-handling of policies. Economic and business activities have been disturbed by myriads of institutional and structural defects which have been accumulated inside the Japanese economy, business, society and the government. As a consequence, the Japanese economy is unable to utilize its potentials, resources, and possibilities, just like a patient could not regain his power because he is suppressed by compound multilateral deceases.

My book tries to analyze such an economy as a physician medically examines the body of the patient, and then tries to suggest effective set of treatment in an attempt to recreate and empower the patient.

The book consists of 12 chapters as follows.
1. Dramatic changes in the global environment and Japanese economy.
2. Government's policies seeking for the recovery of the economy.
3. Negative assets: compound deceases
4. The Japanese System, which ceased to progress
5. A missed opportunity of self-reform: the great earth-quake disaster
6. Provide the population conviction of safety and hopes for the young
7. New strategy for desired energy mix
8. Opening the country for the new era
9. Strategic reform of Japan's agriculture
10. Medicine can be a great growing industry
11. Huge potentials for housing industry
12. Profitable renovation for tourism industry

I the coming weeks, I will introduce the gist of the book in the form of presenting synopses of the content of the book.

Tour to Historic City of Kamakura

On April 3, I visited Japan's historic city of Kamakura with my friends of the Shimada-juku for sightseeing and worshipping shrines and temples. The tour was planned and guided by professor Midori Miyazaki, who currently is the dean of the faculty of policy informatics of Chiba University of Commerce where I serve as president.

Ms. Miyazaki was the first female and popular anchor person for TV program of NHK broadcasting co. She then completed graduate schools and became professor of CUC. She was born and brought up in Kamakura, and has associated with many eminent persons in religious and cultural communities of Kamakura and naturally has an exceptional amount of knowledge of and network in Kamakura. She gave a splendid lecture to us in the Shimada-juku seminar in February on the topic of "Now, Kamakura!!, and to the world", and afterwords kindly offered to us a special tour of Kamakura this time. Thanks to her special and cordial guidance, we were able to enjoy the sanctuaries and the best spots of Kamakura.

Kamakura, which is only 30miles south of Tokyo and located at the shore of the Pacific Ocean, has played a critical role in preparing the subsequent era of modernization in the Japanese history. The first samurai government was established in 12 century which was named the Kamakura Shogunate government. The samurai government ruled Japan for a century and a half. This era and the content of the government signified the epoch of Japan's history of transition from the country ruled by aristocrats to the country ruled by the samurai-class who used to be warriors grown from the commoners.

The samurai government differs clearly from the aristocratic governments which governed Japan for the preceding 5 centuries, in the sense that it originated primitive functions of legislation, courts and administration, and importantly gave quite open and frank atmosphere of the commoners in the government and in the community. The city was constructed in a relatively narrow area of fishermen's village surround by low mountains with a well designed city plan aiming at systematic city structured with main and sub roads running vertically and horizontally which help to locate organically government houses, shrines, temples, shops and residence areas.

We planned to visit the city at the best timing of spring season because Kamakura is well known for cherry blossoms. We hoped that we visit the old city enjoying sightseeing with full bloom of cherries, worship shrines and temples. Unfortunately, however, an exceptionally powerful spring storm suddenly hit the entire Japanese archipelago in the afternoon and the evening, exactly the planned time zone of our visit. We, however, dared to visit the city even blown by strong winds and heavy showers. Ms.Miyazaki told us that in Kamakura, "rain" implies a good luck for the future. Hoping for the good future some twenty participants of the group attempted the tour.

We first visited Tsurugaoka Hachiman-gu shrine. It was built in the beginning of the 12th century by Minamoto, Yoritomo, the founder and the first Shogun of the Kamakura government. The god of the shrine is known for the god of warfare. The shrine was kind enough to bring us to the sacred inner hole, where we worshiped with formal ritual. After the worship, Mr.Yoshida, Shigeho, the supreme monk of the shrine, specially met us in a guest room and gave us special talk of introducing the history of Kamakura, the shrine and the spirit of the Shintoism.

We then visited Kenchoji temple. This is the highest ranked temple of the five major temples of Kamakura. The temple was built 750 years ago. In usual years, the temple is filled with cherry blossoms and other flowers at this time of the year. Unfortunately, due to exceptionally long and cold winter this year, the cherry blossoms were only beginning to bloom. We climbed up to the top of the gate building as an exception and worshipped 500 Buddhism warrior sculptures kept there. After the round trip of the temple, the supreme priest, Mr.Yoshida, Shoudou, kindly welcomed us in a guest room and gave us frank talk of his observations about religions in various countries, particularly of buddhism.

We finally had a great time with the former supreme priest of Engakuji temple, Mr.Adachi, Daishin, who gave a splendid lecture on the subject "how to live." He emphasized above all the importance of keeping the mind of thanking, cherishing the objects and sympathizing pitiful people.

After the religious visits, we enjoyed a splendid dinner at a wonderful Japanese style restaurant named "Hachinoki." Mr. Fujikawa, the owner and manager, prepared special menu for us. This restaurant was visited by many national leaders who attended APEC meeting in November 2010. Mr.Adachi, Daishin, Mr.Asahina, Eon, the resident priest of Jochiji temple, who provided the room for lecture of Mr.Adachi, after the closing time of Engakuji temple, and Mr. Takai, the chief of general affairs of Kenchoji temple joined the dinner party. These high rank priests were surprisingly open and frank, perhaps reflecting the open and friendly atmosphere of Kamakura communities. The violent storm which blew the entire region was utterly gone when we stepped out of restaurant after the dinner.This was indeed a very special moment for us to have enjoyed sacred spots of Kamakura preserving important historical origins of modern Japan.

Walking Tour of Kumano-kodou

In January, I led a group of 10 of my friends of the Shimada-juku, to a walking tour of Kumano-kodou.

Kumano-kodou is a sacred mountainous area in southern Kii-peninsula where roads for pilgrimage were opened in ancient times to worship sacred shrines. There are several routes to visit this area from various starting points such as Kyoto, Ise and others where the emperor, noble aristocrats, samurai and commoners walked along the trails to visit shrines of their destination. There are three main shrines entitled: Hongu-taisha, Hayatama-taisha, and Nachi-taisha, which were established at different times of the period of 9th to 12th centuries. This area was designated as the world cultural heritage in 2004.

On January 21, we flew from Tokyo to Nanki-shirahama airport from Tokyo. We started in the afternoon our walking trip along the route which is to lead to Hongu-taisha. We walked steep slopes and visited Takahara-shrine and small Tsugizakura-shrine on the way, enjoying tranquil atmosphere of the mountain forests and sounds of water falls. The onigiri(rice ball)-lunch pack which was prepared by a humble small shop at the start gave us an impression that we were going to start to a different world. We stayed that night at a country side lodge where simple pot dinner with local vegetables, river fish and wild birds prepared by the lodge master was amazingly delicious.

Next day, we travelled along the roads and trails by walking and by a bus to some extent to visit famous Nachi-water falls. The water fall carries with it painful scars of the disaster caused by enormous rainfalls in September last year. Holly decorations of the top were gone and huge rocks fell to disturb the otherwise smooth and beautiful outlet of waters. We then walked up to worship Nachi-Taisha. On the way to our destination of the day, we walked along the Kamikura-shrine, which is believed to have been a specially sacred shrine in the ancient time to have received the original visit of the god to the earth. One of our members was Mr. Takayuki Kamikura, who is a descendant of Kamikura tribe to have protected the shrine in the history. He was so excited to climb up the steep and high stairs up to the shrine followed by his friends. This shrine is famous for its wild fire lantern festival which is held in the first week of February.

In the evening, we took a delicious dinner at a cuisine inn called Kameya-inn famous for Kumano-region dinner. The governor of Wakayama-prefecture, Mr.Yoshinobu NIsaka kindly joined us. He wished to walk with us all through the Kumano trails, but his busy schedule permitted him to join this dinner and the walking in the morning of the next day. We enjoyed talking on many subjects of our interest. The governor Nisaka is outstanding in his vision, dedication and speed in performing his job. In the wake of an unprecedented rain disaster in last fall, he worked enormously hard to bring the suffered areas back to normal situation as soon as possible.

We stayed over night a different hotel, Midoriya, which is famous of having hot spring bath in the shallow water near the shore of the Kumano river. We enjoyed this special bath. I have been suffering from a cold since the beginning of the trip. But I felt I have been recovering quickly probably because the effect of the Yunomine hot-spring where we took dinner, the hot spring is known since ancient times to have a mystic effect of recovering people.

On the third day, the governor walked with us during the morning. He left us at the hut where we took humble but nice lunch. In the afternoon we visited Kumano Hongu-Taisha. This is a sort of Head quarter of the entire network of Kumano shrines built all around the Japanese archipelago. It was a fine day with crystal blue sky. We felt that our souls were purified by a special divine power. We returned bak to Tokyo in the evening.

After the trip, we visited together a nice and cozy restaurant of Wakayama-style cuisine built recently at Azabu-Juban near Roppongi of Tokyo to thank Ms. Kagari Hine, a capable officer of the prefecture who is in charge of public relations of the prefecture particularly in the area of sight-seeing and truism. She arranged much of our tour. We enjoyed eating and talking and somehow thought about the next trip to Kumano-Kodou.

This time, with a special purpose of visiting the Kamikura shrine at the very day of the wild fire lantern festival. Since it is not easy to visit the shrine on that day because hundreds of thousands of people try to visit there and is difficult to secure a staying place nearby. We decided to ask the governor Nisaka to help us. He gladly offered his help. We are already excited to visit the Kumano-Kodou once again on February 6, next year.

Dinner Recital: " Songs Bring You Around the World"(Part III) Continued from PartII

Out of the total of 33 songs, I sang 24 songs by myself. They are the songs of different countries of 13 different languages. To prepare and to learn such songs, I went to shops of music CDs and collected many CDs containing songs I am interested. My secretary, Ms Naoko Inoh, who is highly capable and talented even in the field of music, helped my incredibly effectively in re-recording such songs in my i-pod, gave hints and suggestions in many details of songs, and helped prepare a comprehensive guide book of all the songs with detailed explanation for each of them. This book was highly appreciated by the guests who came to the recital.

The most difficult challenge for me was to sing songs of French, Russian and Chinese languages. I was lucky, however, that I received many useful guidance and advice on each of these languages from my friends. On Russian songs, Ms. Akiko Oga, who is a highly talented interpreter working with a famous Russian conductor, Mr.Alexander Lazarev, of Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, the board of which I am the chairperson, helped me to practice singing Russian songs by teaching how to pronounce Russian words. On Chinese songs, two professors of Chinese languages of Chiba University of Commerce, Ms. Zenan Shu and Ms. Shi Min helped me from choosing popular Chinese songs and to how to pronounce Chinese words. Two of my friends, professor Kaoru Shimizu of Columbia University and professor of Chiba University of Commerce gave me additional advices.

With the help of all these people, I spent much time, energy and mental concentration to practice singing these songs until I memorize and being able to sing the songs from my heart. For weeks and weeks, I tried to find time to practice songs anywhere and anytime in so far as I do not disturb life of other people. At home, in the car, during holidays, during lunch time, on the way to go and back from golf courses etc, etc. In final few weeks,I made a rule to sing all the 24 songs at least a once a day, which takes about an hour and half, if sang in a row. This was a challenge and is a worthwhile challenge. Because it gave me a target to achieve. This effort seemed to give me even a new kind of meaning to my life.

For several weeks before the recital, I talked to some of my good friends if they would be interested to come to listen to our recital. We sent letters of announcing, invitation and explanation in three stages to those who are interested. On the day of the recital, some 100 guests joined us at the hall of the Tokyo Bay Court Club. We started the recital punctually on 18:30. Everything went very well. We sang songs whole-heartedly. It was the stream of time which excited us, thrilled us, and moved us. My respectful friend, Ms Reiko Yukawa, a renowned music commentator, advised me once that important to remember is to entertain guests and make them enjoy the music as well as singers themselves. I felt, as time passes, the guests were increasingly getting high and excited and apparently enjoying the every moment of the stream of the world tour through the music.

It was an unique, fantastic and extremely satisfying experience. This was made possible by devotion, contribution, understanding and warm support of many friends. I am very, and very thankful for all they have given to this event.

Dinner Recital: " Songs Bring You Around the World"(Part II)

Since I wanted to have this dinner recital in an executive, gorgeous and exclusive atmosphere with delicious food, I asked the chairman and president of the Japan's most luxurious and exclusive club named the Bay Court Club facing the Tokyo Bay managed by the Resort Trust Corporation. They agreed to provide the largest and best hall of the club building and committed to provide the best French full course dinner. Since the club building was built relatively new, the building had not been equipped with a grand piano, I asked their benevolence to obtain a good grand piano. The chairman, Mr.Yoshiro Ito kindly decided to purchase it. I am extremely grateful for their profound understanding of our idea and warm support and cooperation of Mr.Ito and other executives and all the staff of the Bay Court Club to make our unprecedented recital possible.

I planned the whole stream of the recital in such a way that we start visiting European continent from the West starting from France, then Spain and Portugal, and travel along the Mediterranean sea to arrive at Italy. Then go up to Germany and back again to Italy to spend sometime there, and then go across the Atlantic Ocean to visit American continent. This is the first half of the recital. After enjoying the main dishes of the dinner in the intermission, we move on to the rest of the tour. The latter half of the recital is the trip from Eurasian continent to Asia and to South East Pacific and finally back to China. The recital will be concluded by singing a few Christmas songs by all the participants and guests since the recital is held only a few weeks before Christmas.

The songs we sang were:

1. Les Feuilles Mortes
2. Nathalie
3. Coimbra
4. Torna a Surriento
5. An Die Musik
6. Aldila
7. Der Lindenbaum
8. Gute Nache
9. Zueignung
10. E lucevan le stelle
11. I Left My Heart in San Francisco
12. Love Is A Many-Splendored Thing　
13. It’s Only A Paper Moon　
14. The Star-Spangled Banner
15. La Marseillaise
16. Ogonyok
17. Iz-za ostrova na sterzhen
18. Podmoskovnue vechera
19. Arirang
20. Please return to pusan port（Dorawayo Busanhange）
21. Ibyeol
22. Gion-kouta
23. Tinsagunuhana
24. Bengawan Solo
25. Night Jasmine
26. When Will I See You Again
27. The Moon Represents My Heart
28. A Twig of Ume Blossoms
29. I Love My Motherland
30. Crux Fidelis
31. Adeste Fideles
32. Silent Night
33. White Christmas

--To be continued--

Dinner Recital: " Songs Bring You Around the World"(Part I)

On November 29, Haruo and his friends held a major dinner recital entitled, " Songs bring you around the world." This is a recital given by myself and some of my friends who love singing songs with an idea that songs of different countries and nations of their own languages will tell us and make us feel different cultures, histories, thoughts and even ways of life of people. And when we sing songs of different countries around the world all at once, perhaps we may enjoy a virtual trip around the world enjoying to meet the peoples of different countries.

I was initially inspired by this idea when I saw an entertainer in a night club of Istanbul. A few years ago, my wife an I took on a cruising tour around the mediterranean sea by a large cruising ship "MS Zaiderdum" of some 90 thousands tons of Holland American line. In one of the nights, we visited the club where belly dances are exhibited. In intermissions between the shows, an old entertainer took care of hundreds of tourists coming from many different countries of the world by singing songs for each of them of their countries of their own languages. Quite naturally, the tourists who were welcomed by songs of their own countries were extremely happy and excited by the warm reception of the entertainer. I was keenly impressed by the talent, skill, care and hospitality of this entertainer, and then was motivated and asked myself," if he can do this, why not me?"

Getting back home, I told this idea to some of my good friends who love singing songs. I knew that a group of my class mates since my high school and college days has been enjoying singing songs getting together frequently at the home of Mr. and Mrs.Honda. Mr.Chikahiko Honda has been a successful CPA married with Ms.Chikako Honda, who graduated music college and sometime wished to become a professional singer of classic musics. They were joined by Mr.Shigeo Uchida, a journalist and an economist, and Mr.Sadataka Nagumo , a successful businessman in real estate business. They are helped by a charming and highly talented pianist, Ms.Mika Nagatomo. They agreed to prepare this ambitious project with me. I also asked my good friends, Mr.Issei Hideshima, who used to work for Japan Air Lines as a corporate manager of CAs and loves singing popular American songs, and Ms.Emiko Magoshi, who is a well known professor of multicultural communications and loves singing American jazzes. They all agreed to join me to prepare the recital devoting their best to the project.

--To be continued--

100th Anniversary Celebration of the MIT Association of Japan

On November 11, 2011, the association of MIT alumni of Japan held the 100 anniversary celebration at Ark Hills Club in Akasaka area in Tokyo. MIT of course stands for Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

I was invited to give a memorial lecture in that very special event. This was because of the earnest request and recommendation of Mr.Yoichi Yokomizo,the former president of the association whom I used know well as a member of college swimming club which I used to belong, and Mr.Hikaru Shimura, the current president of the association, and perhaps because I was associated with MIT in 1986 as a visiting professor to Sloan School of Management.

The celebration event brought together more than 150 alumni, and the gathering was quite lively, informative and instrumental particularly in networking and making friends. The alumni association of a foreign university kept acting for 100years and still is able to bring together such many alumni, who are playing important roles in their respective profession, seems unique and outstanding. The effort of organizing committee, headed by president Mr.Shimura, must have been exceptional.

The celebration started with the welcoming address of Mr.Hikaru Shimura, which was followed by the anniversary lecture of myself. Then, congratulatory words were given by Mr.Kiyoshi Tsujimura of NTT-DOCOMO, and Mr.Takashi Oyamada of the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Ltd. Then, speech was made by special guest, Dr.Susan Hockfield, the 16th president of MIT. After awards were given to the recent presidents to thank their efforts to maintain and develop the association. At the end of celebration part, Dr.Hiroya Fujisaki, president of the association from 1982 to 1990, gave a brief greeting in 100 year retrospective, and taking advantage of this opportunity donated 100million yen to the association and 150million yen to MIT to celebrate the recent 150 anniversary of MIT. His timely and cordial donation was applauded and respected. After the celebration, the lively and fruitful reception was held.

It was amazing the Dr.Suan Hockfield joined the celebration rushing directly from Narita airport. She left California where she had her business to do only half a day earlier. She visited us managing her very tight traveling schedule. Dr.Hockfield is a renowned life scientist, and contributed greatly to make historic convergence of life sciences with the engineering and physical sciences in fields of from clean energy to cancer. She co-chairs a President Obama's initiative of the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership. Busy as she is, impressive was the fact that she made special effort to join this 100th anniversary and presented well organized speech explaining the status quo of MIT and encouraged Japanese alumni.

I gave a speech entitled, "Japan at a Crossroad: 3.11 and Japan's Recovery," in which I made a rather critical appraisal of our experience of historic disaster, delineated my own view as to what Japan could have done to re-create Japan taking advantage of this historic crisis, and explained challenges and tasks which the new Noda administration is faced. After the speech I received many encouraging comments. This was a good experience for myself.

Visit to Huis Ten Bosch

We, some 20 members of the Shimada Juku, visited "Huis Ten Bosch" in the neighborhood of Nagasaki city in Kyushu in late October. Huis Ten Bosch is Dutch expression of House in the forest. This is the largest pleasure park in Japan. The width is 152 ha, which is comparable of the width of Disney Land and Disney Sea combined in Chiba prefecture near Tokyo. As the single pleasure park, Huis Ten Bosch is by far the largest in Japan.

Huis Ten Bosch was originally planned and constructed in late 1980s and opened operation in 1992. It was planned to replicate the Palais Huis Ten Bosch where Queen Beatrix recede in Holland. The plan was to construct a comprehensive and self contained town of Netherland. Along the sea side, many buildings resembling palace, hotels, commercial buildings, shopping site are constructed in accordance to a compact city planing. In spite of a far-fetching ideal of creating a dream town, the business of Huis Ten Bosch did not run well. It continued to run deficit and accumulated the dept. exceeding the asset and in 2003, it applied to Corporate Reconstruction Law.

Under the regulation of the law, several corporations and funds tried to reconstruct the company, but they never succeeded and the debt kept accumulating. In January 2010, it was determined that the company by the name of H.I.S., which is a major tourism service company, would support the revival project. In June 2010, Mr.Hideo Sawada, the chairperson of H.I.S. took the office of Huis Ten Bosch and launched a vigorous program of revival and reconstruction, and amazingly turned to yield the profit within a year for the first time for the last 18 years. HTB seems to have been reborn as a new viable pleasure park under the leadership of Hideo Sawada.

The reason of our visit of Huis Ten Bosch was largely to witness what is going on there under the leadership of Mr.Sawada, particularly because Mr.Sawada is our proud member of the Shimada Juku, and also to enjoy the best service and attractions of HTB taking advantage of this opportunity.

Mr.Sawada took care of us very well and also explained why he accepted and launched this job. He told us that many of his close friends advised not to take this risky task. There were myriads of negative factors: compared with Disney Land, HTB is 1.6 times larger than Disney land, which means it costs 1.6 times. Disney Land can takes advantage of huge amusement consumption demand of the greater Tokyo region, whereas HTB is far away from there and only next to small consumption market of northern Kyushu, and inconvenient accesses to HTB, etc. On the other hand, there are justifying reasons largely not to terminate this monumental facility of HTB for the benefit of Japan's tourism and amusement business. The most critical reason for him, however, to have accepted the job was his "challenging" spirit to challenge the most difficult task. His passion to try to climb the highest and most difficult mountain in front of him.

As a condition of acceptance, he wrote off all the shares of the old HTB, and created a new company where HIS funded 67% of the capital. This practically meant that he purchased the asset which costed 200 billion dollars with only 2 billions. HTB restarted with no burdens of net debt and depreciations.He also obtained agreement from local government to exempt any asset taxes. With these conditions, he started the new job. It meant that he already won the game of financing and taxes before he started the game.

However, there were even more heavier challenges before him. One was the " defeat mentality" of some 1000 employees who never experienced "victory" during the successive deficit prone period. Mr.Sawada asked (1) to clean every corner of the park every day, (2) behave gayly even if you don't feel like it, (3) reduce cost 20% and increase sales 20%. He encouraged employees everyday and the culture became increasingly positive. Another was to produce visible and attractive program successively. The most notable of many he tried was a world gardening competition, which increased half a million visitors relative to previous years. Our friend, Mr.Masatoshi Miyagawa, another member of Shimada Juku who runs flowers markets on his own business, played a critical role to reduce costs and increased quality of flowers. HTB turned to a shining flower garden throughout the year. These seem to be critical reasons behind the quick turn around of HTB from deficit prone park to profitable business.

We enjoyed visiting many amusement facilities, exhibitions, mini-concerts, short boat trips, nice restaurants, enjoyable talks at HTB for two days. This was an enjoyable, amusing and enlightening tour of an October holiday.

今次、TPP交渉参加の問題点

このブログは私は原則、英語で書いているが、この問題については日本人ならびに日本語の読者にも読んで戴きたく、例外で、日本語のコメントを掲載させて戴くことにした。

野田佳彦首相は来る11月12～13日にハワイで開催されるAPEC首脳会議で、TPP交渉参加の意志表明をする腹づもりのようだ。

TPPは自由貿易を促進する国際協力のひとつで、私は元来、自由貿易が、関係諸国の経済効率を高め、人々の生活水準の向上に役立つ限りにおいて、自由貿易の促進には賛成する立場をとって来たし、また現在でもその立場に変わりはない。その意味で、TPPの目的や広域自由貿易圏をつくろうというその趣旨には賛成である。

しかし今回のTPP交渉に参加するかどうかという個別具体的な問題については、いわば戦術的な意味で、多いに注意して置かなくてはならない問題があることを私達は充分に自覚しておく必要がある。その意味で今回はとくに日本語でもコメントを書かせて戴いた。

TPPは2006年に、シンガポール、NZ、チリ、ブルネイの4カ国からなる通称P4の自由貿易協定としてスタートした。環太平洋地域の諸国にその頃から参加の呼びかけが行われた。2010年までに、アメリカ合衆国、オーストラリア、ヴェトナム、ペルーが加わり、やや遅れたマレーシアが参加したP9となった。

TPPは貿易財については全品目にわたって即時ないしは段階的に自由化をめざし、またサービス、政府調達、競争政策、知的財産権、労働移動などについては包括的な協定をめざす、としている。

日本は過去数年にわたって参加の誘いをうけていたが、実質的な対応はとっとこなかった。2010年11月の横浜APEC首脳会議に際に菅直人首相がTPP参加を検討すると発言したが、その後は、ほとんど実質的な動きはなく、また情報の収集も、分析もしてこなかった。情報の収集は、参加国でないから蚊帳の外に置かれたという事情もあったが、参加・不参加の功罪は、農林水産省や経済産業省が、それぞれ数兆円の違いになるとしてかなり粗っぽい前提の下で全く異なった主張をした程度で、総合的、本格的な政策分析が行われたとは言い難い。

一方、この数年、TPPの枠組みの中で、24の分野で作業部会が立ち上げられてかなり詳細な議論をしていると伝えられ、また、これまでに9回にわたる全体会合が参加各国の持ち回りで開催されて来ており、TPPの内容について相当進んだ議論がなされていると推察される。推察というのは日本は参加表明をしていないという理由で情報が政府当局にも提供されていないからである。

こうした状況の下で、来る11月12～13日に野田総理は交渉参加の意思表明をすると推察されるが、上記の状況は、国益を最重視しつつ参加する国際交渉の常識から見ると極めて異様な状況に見えるので、ここでいくつかの点について改めて注意を喚起し、日本としてどう行動するのが国益にかなっているのか、ここで考えてみたい。

（1）TPPに関する内容や規約はこれまでの参加国の間ですでにほとんど詰められているように推察されるが、これに参加するとなればアメリカに次ぐ市場を提供することになる日本にその内容がほとんど知らされていないという状況は奇異であり異常である。事前の検討のために必要な情報がない中で参加の意志決定が迫られるとう不自然さは納得しがたい。参加国でないから情報は提供できないという建前のようだが、参加するとなれば大規模な構造改革や制度改革が必要になる可能性が大きく、経済構造や国民生活に重大な影響の及ぶ可能性が大きいこうした国際協定の議論の中味を未参加だからという理由で情報開示をしないことは妥当ではないだろう。

（2）参加している9カ国の中ではアメリカが圧倒的な比重を占めており、他は小国なので、アメリカが貿易と投資で実質的な成果を挙げる目的でTPPを利用するならば、中国が参加しない以上、その最大のねらいは当然、日本を巻込み日本の市場に浸透することと考えられる。実際、日本が参加すれば日米両国のGDPの比重は9割を超えると推察される。

（3）貿易財の関税の撤廃、非貿易財に関する総合的な国際ルールの策定といった遠大な目的をかかげるTPPだが、こうした交渉は二国間交渉でも相当の準備と時間がかかる。ましてこれまでの経験が示しているようにGATTとWTOといった多国間交渉ではあまりに時間がかかってラチが開かないので、世界中で、多くの地域自由貿易協定が結ばれてきた経緯がある。今回のTPPで不可解なことは、2国間交渉でもすくなくとも数年以上の時間がかかりそうな膨大な課題を掲げているにもかかわらず、多国間交渉というテコを使って、それを1～2年で達成しようという拙速さは理解しがたい。しかも日本が11月のAPECハワイ会議で参加表明をしても、実際の協議に参加できるためには既参加国での検討に半年以上に時間がかかるとされ、実際の参加は来年の夏頃になると見込まれるという。その間に、参加国の間で実質的な協議がさらに進み、日本の交渉余地はさらに狭まるおそれがある。

（4）情報がほとんど欠如ないし著しく不足したままで参加の意思表明が迫られるという異常な状況に対し、前原誠司氏ほか若干の政治家が、「参加した後で交渉の展開によっては離脱もあり得る」とコメントしたが、これに対してアメリカ政府の高官が直ち「我々は真摯な参加国のみを歓迎する」と反論したと伝えられる。このやりとりは前原氏他の方が自然に思える。アメリカには何か急がなくてはならない特別な理由があるのだろうか。

こうした状況をふまえると、11月のAPECハワイ首脳会議では、野田首相がかりにTPP交渉への参加表明をするとしても、それは今後の交渉のあり方、進め方について特別の覚悟をもって臨む必要があると考える。

自由貿易を促進するというTPPの趣旨は望ましいものとしても、日本にとって大きな構造や制度の改革を必要とする国際協定への参加にあたって、これまでに累積した情報不足や交渉の余地の縮小といういわば”負の遺産”を叶う限り解消する効果的な交渉努力が何よりも重要である。

もし日本の国益を守りかつ促進するうえで、充分な情報と交渉の余地が確保し難い状況であるならば、ハワイのAPEC首脳会議では、参加発言を見送る選択肢もあり得ると思う。カナダは参加表明になお慎重であり、その慎重さには一理がある。

TPP交渉参加を急ぐべきだとの見解には、自由貿易促進という一般論の他に、（1）重要な同盟国アメリカに協力すべき、（2）交渉参加が遅れるほど情報ギャップが大きくなり交渉の余地が狭まる、（3）アメリカとの2国間協議よりも多国間協議の方が交渉の範囲を広くとれる、（4）多国間協定を進める方がやがて中国などを取り込みやすくなる、などの論点が含まれているようだ。そのうち（1）は重要であるとしても、（2）の不利性は変わらない、そして（3）と（4）の現実性は自明ではない。日本という経済大国にとっては、本来は、最大のパートナーであるアメリカと真摯に自由貿易協定を結ぶ方が、望ましい戦略ではないかと思う。その点では韓国の知恵に学ぶところがあるように思う。

野田首相は、ハワイのAPEC首脳会議で、かりにTPP交渉への参加表明をするにしても、国益と世界益を真剣にふまえ、場合によっては今回は参加を見送る、あるいは、日米自由貿易協定を結ぶ努力もありうることを視野に入れつつ、もし参加するなら、これまでの情報ギャップを充分に解消し、日本が充分な交渉の余地を確保できるよう、覚悟を決めて、効果的な意志表明をしてもらいたいと思う。