Japan is the 3rd largest economy in the world in nominal GDP. It also hosts some of the largest general trading companies in the world. These companies are active in a wide variety of industries and are the focal point of global value chains from raw material production to end-product customer sales. This means not just opportunities for traditional exports, but also for investments, co-innovation, material or technology supply.
The Japanese government has only recently started shifting focus on bio and circular economy, behind the Western world and with an urgency to catch up. Wider nation wide strategies are now forming, and specific targets will most likely include areas of national interest such as fuel supply, chemical intermediates, or agricultural and food products.
The goal of the virtual delegation program is to connect the Finnish bio and circular economy industry to Japanese companies in this critical timing to catch the rising wave of government policy and focus on the Olympics.
- The Japanese government is to increase bio plastics production to 2 million tons/year by 2030
- Large brands and their suppliers (both manufacturing and trading companies) are looking for alternatives to plastics and other fossil-based materials, switching to bio-based ones and getting rid of excess plastics use
- Japanese legislation that entered 2010 into force to promote use of wood in public buildings
- To reduce CO2 emissions from private housing, the government is promoting the spread of net-zero-energy housing (ZEH). The target is having the majority of new housing produced by housing manufacturers built as ZEH by 2020
Interested? Please register no later than September 18, 2020
