Free Human Trafficking Around the World by Stephanie Hepburn

mentioned that “many teachers are not willing to talk about issues too shocking for children” and refused to give clear answers as to whether the government is willing to include trafficking issues in human rights education.
    2
    According to Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), efforts have been made to improve sex education through the subjects of physical education, health, and science (MOFA, 1999). But schools and health organizations do not always cooperate (Matsumoto, 1995). According to Chieko Ishiwata, “The issues of who should be providing sexual education, the extent of it, and how it is taught are extremely complicated.” For instance, curriculum guidelines imposed by the Ministry of Culture, Sports, Science and Technology limit the language teachers can use in teaching about sex and what topics they can discuss (Ishiwata, 2011). Masako Ono-Kihara, director at the UNAIDS Collaborating Centre on Socio-Epidemiological HIV Research and associate professor at the Kyoto University School of Public Health, said that teachers of sex education have to walk the line between cultural values and modern lifestyles. “This gap must be eradicated. But at the same time, we must be careful to consider family values where some protected young children might not be ready for explicit information” (Kakuchi, 2004).
    Despite what appears to be societal and governmental naïveté on the topic of trafficking, Japan did adopt a national action plan of measures to combat trafficking in persons in 2004. Many skeptics hold that this was simply a political move to appease foreign nations as opposed to an acknowledgment that trafficking is indeed a problem within Japan. According to Farrer, the U.S. State Department
Trafficking in Persons Report
had a big effect on the Japanese Ministry of Justice. “There were open discussions on the topic of trafficking around that time, but they soon subsided. The societal perception is that trafficking probably exists on a small scale but that it is not a big part of the sex industry or that of labor.” 3
    JAPAN AS A DESTINATION
    Human trafficking accelerated in Japan in the 1980s as a result of rapid economic growth and increased labor demands in bars and restaurants. Persons from Thailand and the Philippines entered the country, often through channels associated with crime syndicates (ILO, 2005). Between 2001 and 2007, MOFA reported 498 identified sex-trafficking victims. The primary countries of origin were Thailand (35.3 percent), the Philippines (23.9 percent), Indonesia (15.3 percent), Colombia (11.6 percent), and Taiwan (8.2 percent) (MOFA, 2008b). Victims are also trafficked to Japan for commercial sexual exploitation from Russia and other nations in eastern Europe, as well as from East Asia and Southeast Asia. Persons are trafficked to Japan from China, Indonesia, and Vietnam for forced labor (U.S. Department of State, 2009). Most foreign persons in the Japanese sex industry are Asian nationals, but a surprising number of victims are from Latin America and the Caribbean. Latin Americans are the largest non-Asian ethnic group in Japan. Roughly 1,700 women are trafficked each year from Latin America and the Caribbean to Japan, primarily for commercial sexual exploitation. The primary countries of origin are Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. Other nations of origin are Argentina, Chile, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, and Paraguay (OAS, 2005).
    In the past, foreign nationals were often brought into Japan under the entertainer visa. The law was made more stringent in 2005 and 2006, creating stricter obligations for employers—such as a salary of no less than $2,226.59 per month and increasing disqualification standards for operators, managers, and other regular employees of the inviting organization (MOFA, 2008b). Masatoshi Shimbo, deputy director-general of MOFA’s Foreign Policy Bureau, said the measures drastically reduced the number of persons entering the country