BENGALURU: Japan needs as many as five lakh skilled professionals from India for the IT, medicine and services sectors, according to the Japanese-Consul General in Bengaluru, Takayuki Kitagawa. He also hopes that a major part of this requirement is met by professionals from Karnataka.
Kitagawa hosted the ‘Japanese Speaking Event’ at his official residence at High Grounds on Sunday, where he spoke to City Express. He further says, “Of the five lakh Indians, two lakh would be required to fill positions in the growing IT sector of our country.
Another three lakh would be for profiles such as nurses, positions in the services sector in retail and sales and construction, to name a few. India has a skilled workforce that we want to tap. My personal aim is to recruit as many as 30,000 to 40,000 from Bengaluru and Karnataka itself,” adds Kitagawa.
The event was also attended by representatives of two recruitment firms based in Japan with offices in India. Describing recruitment as one of the main aims for the meet, Kitawaga says, “Increasing the population of Japanese-speaking Indians in the country and spreading our culture are the other two aims.”
Explaining the situation in Japan, Kitagawa highlighted the fact that there is a dire need for skilled labour. “Many Japanese live alone in urban areas. A lot of them use robots for company.
This is just one example in the field of robotics and artificial intelligence, where skilled workers are needed,” he adds. Giving another example, he said, “A lot of technology in the agriculture sector is also required because it is mostly the older people who are into it. So technology is seen as a way to fill this gap, which again requires highly skilled people,” he adds.
Vinay Poddar, representative of Alp Consulting Ltd (known as Out-Sourcing Ltd in Japan), told CE that their aim is to send at least around 500 skilled workers by December. The firm has sent around 100 such workers to Japan so far. “The highest demand is for engineers and those with MBA degrees. There are also requirements for workers with non-technical skills, mainly in the hospitality and education sectors. Speaking a certain level of Japanese is a prerequisite to be recruited for technical work.”
Takuma Morido, country manager, Japan Desk, RGF HR Agent, highlighted that the requirement is not only in Japan, but in India as well. “We have been in India for eight years now. While the requirement of workers with technical skills is huge in our country, there is also a big requirement in India for people who are proficient in the Japanese language. This is for sectors such as HR, translation and interpretation profiles in the 1,000 Japanese companies that also have offices in India. In fact, the requirement is so much that we have been concentrating only on this vertical for the past two-three years,” he adds.