Why Japan-China ties can benefit from promoting people-to-people exchanges

Japan and China are Asian powerhouses that should collaborate responsibly for the peace and prosperity of the region. However, bilateral relations have experienced ups and downs since the start of the century and are now at their lowest point after normalisation in 1972. A major cause of this is the widening perception and information gap between the two nations that needs to be addressed through direct people-to-people contact.Some, perhaps many, misunderstand that Japan and China are always quarrelling with each other. This is not the case. Most of the time, cooperation and exchange go on in the fields of business and economy, environment, entertainment, academia, sister city ties and so on, providing resilience in the bilateral relationship. An example is the advanced “green” fertiliser plant in Bangladesh that was jointly constructed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and China National Chemical Engineering and Construction Corporation Seven Ltd, and completed in November 2023.This case signifies the compatibility of China’s Belt and Road Initiative and Japan’s Free and Open Indo-Pacific in collaborating on a good project, akin to two constellations sharing a bright star.