In order to accept technical trainees from India in the field of nursing care, the government plans to establish a base in the South Asian country that will provide preliminary training programs in areas such as Japanese language and nursing care education, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned.
According to sources, the government will send Japanese language teachers and nursing care workers to New Delhi in autumn at the earliest. The government aims to help overcome staff shortages in the field by providing this assistance with the aim of raising the levels of Indian trainees' communication skills -- which are indispensable for nursing care -- and related technical skills, thereby promoting the flow of nursing care workers between India and Japan.
A system that enables foreign technical trainees to work in nursing care was established following the enforcement in November last year of the Proper Technical Intern Training and Protection of Technical Intern Trainees Law.
The law is intended to strengthen the protection of foreign trainees, who come to Japan to learn the necessary skills for a variety of jobs, as well as to expand the Technical Intern Training Program. It extended the training period at appropriate supervising organizations from a maximum of three years to five years.
Trainees are required to be proficient enough to understand basic Japanese when they arrive in the country. They also need to be able to use technical terms for nursing care and nuanced Japanese expressions.
The government, therefore, decided to launch preliminary training programs in India to stably secure highly skilled "work-ready" personnel.
Specifically, the government plans to set up a Japanese language education center in a nursing college and other institutions in New Delhi where trainees will be able to take language classes for six to eight months. Japanese nursing care workers will be dispatched from Japan to the local chamber of commerce and other organizations that will send trainees to Japan, to provide technical training.
Trainees will be introduced to nursing care-related curricula and study materials as well as rehabilitation programs and activities that support the independence of those in need of nursing care in Japan, the sources said.
Private education and welfare institutions will be in charge of dispatching Japanese language teachers and nursing care workers, while the Japanese government will bear their travel expenses and the costs of preparing study materials.
In April next year, "nursing care" will be added as a new residency status for those who have completed the Technical Intern Training Program. The government considers the planned project in India to be a model for its efforts to secure more nursing care workers.
With a low birth rate and graying population, Japan is expected to face a shortage of about 380,000 nursing care workers in 2025, according to the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry. It is also an urgent task for India, which has a population of more than 1 billion, to foster human resources in the field of nursing care in preparation for a future increase in elderly people. India assumes that nursing care workers who complete their period of stay in Japan will take a job in the field after they return to their country.
Read more from The Japan News at https://japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/
