The Brazilian community is the third largest foreign community in Japan today. There are 274.7 thousand Brazilians, 613,791 Koreans, and 462,396 Chinese citizens in Japan.
Based on the last Japanese census, sociologist í‚ngelo Ishi, Professor of the University of Musashi, published in the Alternativa magazine, in the beginning of the year, a study about these Brazilians that, in 2003, made up the dekassegui community.
This magazine is one of the 12 published by the Brazilian community, who also has two weekly newspapers, a television network, and several Internet radio stations.
In the beginning of the 90s, over 60 thousand Brazilians used to leave to Japan in a single year. Today, the community is still growing, but at much lower rates.
Between 2002 and 2003, the community grew 2.4%, or 6,388 people. According to a psychologist of the São Paulo Catholic University, Kyoko Nakagawa, it is estimated that 3 thousand babies are born per year in that community.
The dekasseguis (or burajirujins, as Brazilians living in Japan are also known) community has 16,771 children of up to 4 years of age. While in the beginning of the migratory movement, men were the absolute majority, today there are 123,564 women among the 274.7 thousand Brazilians in Japan.
More than half of the women are in the 20-39 year age group, and there are almost 7 thousand women who are more than 60 years old.
Os burajirujins are spread throughout 47 Japanese provinces. In some regions, such as the province of Shizuoka, they total over 50% of all resident aliens.
And, according to Ishi, “even though foreigners still represent less than 2% of Japanese population, some cities are becoming real laboratories that allow for Japanese to get used to people from other nationalities, especially Brazilians.”
Agência Brasil