Global industry chain stability key

“The advantages of China are obvious, especially because China has a huge consumer market. Japan is in a phase of population decline and its domestic market is gradually shrinking, so it is important for Japanese companies to pay greater attention to the market which has a population of more than 1.4 billion people,” Yusaku Nishimura, professor of the Institute of International Economy at the Beijing-based University of International Business and Economics, told the Global Times. According to Nishimura’s observation, from the last few decades, direct investment by Japanese companies has shifted from “world factory-type investment” that used to regard China as a processing trade base to “world markettype investment” based on a consumption base. Nishimura said he was not sure who in Japan really touts “decoupling” from China, but he was clear that the opposition comes mainly from the business community.

In 2019, when the Donald Trump administration called for “decoupling” from China, Marukawa said, the US crackdown on Chinese companies such as Huawei would affect companies in many other countries, including Japan, and would interrupt the international industrial chain and breed a block economy.

“This is not the time when we must give up our business dealings with China, and there is no need to limit our own development for fear of ‘decoupling,’” he told the Global Times.

It is well known that the US government has asked Japan and other US allies to take actions to impose restrictions on semiconductor exports to China. Japanese government officials said that after having received the US proposal, Japan is also discussing what restrictions it can implement.

In a response, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said in early November that the US has repeatedly abused export control measures, maliciously blocked and suppressed Chinese companies, and coerced allies to participate in the economic containment of China.

The US’ actions have greatly undermined the stability of the global industrial chain and supply chain, seriously violated free trade rules, and seriously damaged the economic development and people’s well-being of all countries, Zhao said.

Zhao also urged “other countries” to independently make correct judgments based on their own long-term interests and the fundamental interests of the international community.

"Japan is less willing to use its ‘economic weapon’ to put pressure on other countries,” Marukawa told the Global Times, while saying that, with the exception of some rightwingers, there are few voices in Japan advocating for “decoupling” from China.

If Japan wants to “decouple” from China, it will be done under the pressure from the US, Marukawa said. If Japan does not “get in step” with the US, then the US strategy of containing China’s advanced technology growth will be thwarted. Until now, Japan’s commercial “decoupling” from China has been limited to very few sectors, such as equipment exports to Chinese semiconductor makers, he said.

“China’s population and its total foreign trade volume account for about 18 percent and one-fifth of the world’s total respectively. Globalization without China is not true globalization, and ‘decoupling’ from China is just empty talk,” Yuki Izumikawa, an official of the Japanese Association for the Promotion of International Trade, shared his personal thoughts with the Global Times.