While a new visa system approved by the Diet, set to take effect in April, has been welcomed by Japan's labor-short nursing care businesses, questions remain about how to provide sufficient Japanese-language education for foreign workers. Despite steps taken by the government in recent years to relax rules on foreign workers in the sector, language skills have been a major barrier. Vu Thi Thu Trang from Vietnam is among those who could obtain working status after the government eased the requirement for foreign nationals to work as caregivers. The 31-year-old certified caregiver, who came to Japan in 2014, said she first found out about nursing care work while studying at a Japanese language school. She then entered a caregiver vocational school and finished a two-year curriculum earlier this year.

The child of a refugee from Vietnam is striving to realize her dream of building a Japanese language school in the Southeast Asian country. "My dream is to do something that would serve as a bridge between Japan and Vietnam," said Doan Thy Trang, 27. To achieve that goal, she founded a consulting firm in Akashi, a city in Hyogo Prefecture facing the Seto Inland Sea, in January 2015. Trang explained that many business trainees from Vietnam she meets through her work have little difficulty communicating with Japanese in daily conversations but struggle with technical terms. "Vietnamese need a school that teaches them Japanese language used in workplaces," she said.