Japan can offer experience, expat says
Despite speaking fluent Chinese with a Beijing accent, there are some clues that identify Ted Tokuchi as being Japanese — the tidiness of his small Beijing office, a laptop-sized wooden tea table and his dark gray business suit.
The 65-year-old former senior executive of China’s largest securities company, CITIC Securities International, was given the country’s top award for foreign experts — the Friendship Award — in 2009.
Having spent two-thirds of his life in China, Tokuchi believes that the country will play a crucial role as a future world leader.
“If the rest of the world is white and China is red, then the global future will be pink,” he said. “China’s State power and its global influence is growing. In 2002, when I decided to work for CITIC Securities International, many foreigners still hesitated to come to China because they didn’t see a big capital market. Facts speak louder than words.”
Tokuchi has read the report General Secretary Xi Jinping delivered at the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China several times. In the report, he was impressed by the concept of a “New Era” — a period that China is going through that will allow it to achieve a bright future for the country and the Party, as well as realizing the common prosperity of its people.
“China has witnessed significant growth in recent years. And the country’s growing power will trigger concerns or even worries from other countries,” Tokuchi said. “Xi’s attitude has put the world’s mind at ease and the country has shown that it will never seek hegemony, no matter how strong it becomes.”
He also believes China faces a bright future as it can draw on other countries’ experiences. For example, as the country undergoes rapid urbanization and sees an increasingly aging society, Japan’s experience can play a guiding role.
In 2012, some expatriates took the lead and launched an advisory committee under the support of the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs. Now the committee has more than 50 members, and Tokuchi was one of the first.
In the past five years, he has drafted several proposals to the State Council. Those proposals include a cross-administrative regional co-development plan, which was incorporated into the overall plan for the BeijingTianjin-Hebei region. He also provided a detailed suggestion on the development of China’s time-honored brands and big family enterprises based on Japan’s experience.
Next year’s proposal, he said, will be about service regulations and laws relating to care for the elderly. He said current elderly care services in China are mainly linked to real estate projects. Governments grant new building plots to property developers at low prices on condition that they provide elder care services as part of the project.
“But our experiences show that such services should be conducted by professionals and under the protection of related laws or regulations,” Tokuchi said. “I’d like to promote more exchanges on the issue between experts and governors from the two countries. In the new era, we are facing similar challenges and should work together to seek joint development.”