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Introducing
KAIZEN in Africa (PDF
708KB)
(October 2009) Japan
assimilated and developed the American method of improving quality and
productivity as “kaizen” after 1950s. It drew attentions of the world after
1980s, because of Japan's improvement of competitive strengths. As a result,
Kaizen began to be adapted to the West and other developing countries.
Kaizen assistance by Japanese ODA has been implemented in Asia (ex:
Singapore), Latin America (ex: Brazil, Castalia), and South Africa recently
(Egypt, Tunisia). Ethiopia is also showing strong interest in Japanese
development experiences and introducing kaizen in Ethiopian firms. This book
aims to introduce the basic concept and characteristics of kaizen to African
audience and explain how Japan has implemented kaizen assistance in
developing countries. It also discusses the factors that affect the
performance of international kaizen assistance. Kaizen is
applicable not only to the manufacturing sector but also to the service
sector, public organizations, and non-profit organizations. This book also
provides information on the history of Japan's quality and productivity
improvement. (October 2009, GRIPS Development Forum) If you wish to have a
hard copy, please email us.
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Mission
Report to Germany and the UK (PDF 210KB)
(August 2009) Prof. Izumi Ohno and Sayoko Uesu (research associate) visited
Germany (Bonn, Eschborn, Frankfurt) and the UK (London) during July 28 to
August 6, 2009 and met policymakers, practitioners, and researchers in the
areas of development cooperation, especially on industrial development and
public-private partnerships. While the UK focuses on the “market development
approach” with attention to market functions and the business
environment, Germany takes “multi-level approach” paying attention not only
to the investment and business climate (macro-level), but also to industrial
structure and inter-firm linkages (meso-and micro-levels). Given some
commonalities found in German and Japanese approaches to industrial
development, it appears that there exist scope for the two countries to
promote further mutual learning and disseminate jointly their approaches. We
also visited the DFID-funded, International Growth Center, which is
initiating growth policy engagement in selected African and South Asian
countries. In both Germany and the UK, we have felt their strong interest in
the East Asian development experiences and Japan's approach to growth
support.
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"The Middle Income Trap―Implications
for Industrialization Strategies in East Asia and Africa―"
written by Kenichi Ohno
(PDF 630KB)
(January 2009) This publication includes three policy
discussion papers which were targeted different
audiences, they all evolve around the same principal message that latecomer
countries may reach
― an intermediate level of development by
macroeconomic stabilization, institution-building, and opening up and
liberalizing the national economy, but to go beyond middle income the
government must launch more active industrial strategies with tenacity and
dexterity. This volume argues that effective policy actions are still
possible without violating any WTO rules or other international commitments
of our age.
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