A Message on the 20th Anniversary of the Japan International Cooperation System

The Japan International Cooperation System (JICS) was established as a public-service foundation in April 1989 upon authorization by the Minister for Foreign Affairs. As part of Japan's economic cooperation activities, JICS aims to promote high-quality international cooperation by providing appropriate and effective assistance in implementing bilateral grant activities. Over the years, JICS' operations have steadily expanded to yen loans and to overall international cooperation projects in addition to those of Japan's Official Development Assistance (ODA), and we now marked the 20th anniversary of JICS' founding on April 12, 2009.

Over that time, JICS has been able to make a notablet contribution to Japan's international cooperation activities, with the guidance of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and others, and with the support of various foreign government organizations and ODA-related bodies. I wish to express my deep gratitude for the support and cooperation these parties have extended to JICS.

Global conditions have markedly changed in the past 20 years, as has the environment in which Japan's ODA operates. The Japanese Government's allocation for ODA out of the general account budget peaked at 1.1687 trillion yen in FY1997 and has been declining ever since. Examining the budget for FY2009 by category, the budgets for technical cooperation and grant aid have increased year-on-year for the first time in nine years, but the overall ODA budget stood at 672.2 billion yen, down 42.5% from the peak figure. We are required now to work harder to implement efficient and effective aid within a limited budget.

To make this possible, new JICA was born in October 2008 when JICA and the yen loan division of the former Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) were amalgamated into a single organization for implementing ODA. It is expected that this organizational change will strengthen the aid implementation process and that coordination among assistance programs, which consist of technical cooperation, grant aid and loan aid, will generate a synergy effect at the same time.

Against the backdrop of the major change in the aid implementation process and of a growing need to implement more effective and efficient assistance, JICS actively makes suggestions to New JICA, based on its organization's experience and know-how as a procurement agent over the past 20 years, to improve the efficiency of implementation procedures and to materialize system design for new programs.

While working on a main business of procuring equipment and materials, we have been engaged in the most challenging projects since our founding such as assistance to reconstruct public facilities in the countries affected by the earthquake off the coast of Sumatra and tsunami in the Indian Ocean of 2004 and assistance to rehabilitate devastated facilities in Iraq and in Afghanistan.

In recent years the experience and know-how accumulated in implementing such projects are being put to good use in new projects for grant aid for disaster prevention and reconstruction and grant aid for community empowerment, toward which we are working wholeheartedly.

Additionally, JICS continues to serve as a procurement agent for Japanese governments'other aid programs, such as environment program grant aid, food aid and grant assistance for underprivileged farmers. They are all intended to alleviate the global-scale problem of climate change and the consequent sharp increase in food prices which might cause a food crisis in developing countries.

JICS has also been actively involved in international assistance projects other than Japan's ODA. In FY2008, JICS undertook new projects as a procurement agent for avian flu support measures for the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) and for the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF).

Based on the JICS Vision and the JICS Code of Conduct, JICS looks forward to your support and understanding as it strives to be a reliable procurement organization in the eyes of both Japan and the world and contribute to efficient implementation of Japan's ODA. On the occasion of our 20th anniversary, all of us at JICS resolve anew to work together to make this organization better, and we look forward to your continued support.

Takahisa Sasaki
President
Japan International Cooperation System

August 2009