7 - British Week in Tokyo, 1969

Summary

INTRODUCTION

THE BRITISH WEEK held in Tokyo from 26 September 1969 was a successful example of official efforts to promote British exports to the growing Japanese market in the 1960s. The Week was the result of sustained cooperation and work in both London and Tokyo. In London the Board of Trade and the British National Export Council's Asia Committee sought and obtained the cooperation of British firms who were already exporting to Japan and persuaded many others to try the market. In Tokyo the British embassy worked closely with the British Chamber of Commerce and Industry and with British and Japanese firms in Tokyo to make the week a success.

The Board of Trade spent a large part of their budget for trade promotion in the preparation and organization of the events, which were held during British Week. They provided a British Week office under me to work with the commercial department of the embassy where Hugh Cortazzi was the commercial counsellor.

The Queen's sister Princess Margaret supported by her husband Lord Snowdon opened the Week with maximum publicity.

LEAD UP

The British embassy in Tokyo, especially after the success of Prime Minister Ikeda Hayato's successful double the Income policies in the late 1950s, had consistently drawn attention to the prodigious growth of Japanese industry and the increasing potential of the Japanese market. This coincided with a renewed emphasis on trade promotion work in the diplomatic service. Sir Francis Rundall, British ambassador from 1963 to 1967, recommended the strengthening of the commercial department and urged that greater resources should be devoted to trade promotion in Japan. His recommendations were endorsed in London and Hugh Cortazzi was appointed commercial counsellor in 1966 with a brief to expand trade promotion efforts in parallel with continuing attempts to persuade the Japanese authorities in the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) to reduce obstacles to imports and liberalize Japanese trade in the wake of the revised Anglo-Japanese Commercial Treaty of 1962.

Britain sought greater opportunities for British exports in both capital and consumer goods. Because the obstacles to imports of consumer goods were thought to be greater than for capital goods and because of the wide variety of potential exporters of consumer goods it was decided to concentrate some of the available resources on consumer products.