Japan Makes Taxi, Bus Driver Jobs More Obtainable for Foreigners; Paper Exams Now Offered in 20 Languages

By Masaki Fukunaga / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer

1:00 JST, October 6, 2024

OSAKA — The exam to obtain a license to drive taxis and buses can now be taken in 20 languages, making it easier for foreign nationals to become drivers in Japan.

As transportation services are suffering an increasingly serious driver shortage, the government plans to accept up to 24,500 foreign nationals to work as drivers of taxis, buses and trucks in the five-year period through fiscal 2028.

Industry must train foreign drivers

In March, the Cabinet approved a policy to add vehicle transportation services to the list of job categories for which foreign workers can receive “specified skilled worker” resident status, allowing them to obtain medium- and long-term visas.

In Japan, to drive taxis and other vehicles for the transportation industry, people need to obtain a Class 2 driver’s license, and there have been calls for the paper exam to be available in multiple languages among companies in the industry.

Based on the decision of the National Police Agency to allow applicants to take the exams in foreign languages, police nationwide gradually began working on making the exam available in multiple languages. As of Sept. 6, all prefectural police authorities have made it possible to take the exam in 20 languages.

According to the transport ministry, the number of taxi drivers in Japan was about 240,000 at the end of fiscal 2022, about 40% lower than the number at the end of fiscal 2010, when it stood at about 400,000. Amid a shortage of transportation for local people and tourists, the NPA judged that they needed to make it possible for foreign nationals to easily obtain Class 2 driver’s licenses.

In consideration of the situation of foreign residents in Japan, the NPA selected the 20 foreign languages mainly from among those in Asia, and as of the end of July, 992 people had taken foreign-language exams across the nation, and 408 of them had passed, according to the NPA.

From now on, it will be important to develop an environment in which foreign taxi drivers can learn not only service manners and driving skills but also how to respond to mechanical trouble, accidents and other emergencies.

The nation’s taxi industry consists of about 17,000 companies, more than 80% of which are small and midsize companies, owning 30 or fewer vehicles each.

“It is a heavy burden for small and midsize companies to prepare training systems on their own,” said Nagoya University Prof. Hirokazu Kato, an expert on public transportation policy studies. “The administrative authorities will need to assist them, and the whole of the industry will have to commit to educating drivers.”

More tourists, more drivers

Matsushima Mobility Service in Kyoto, which operates taxis and hired cars, employs a driver from Morocco.

In late July, Belkouchia Youssef, 41, took the paper exam to obtain a Class 2 driver’s license in Arabic, his native language, at the offices of the Osaka prefectural police. He passed on his first try.

Belkouchia married a Japanese woman and came to Japan in 2017, joining the company in June this year. He has experience working as a bus driver in Morocco, and he is fluent in daily conversational Japanese. But it was difficult for him to read and write kanji, and he was anxious about the paper exam, which also asks questions about technical terms.

About 80% of Matsushima Mobility’s clients are foreign nationals, including inbound tourists. With the number of foreign inbound tourists recovering after the easing of COVID-19 restrictions, the company enthusiastically employs foreign nationals as drivers.

Since late August, Belkouchia has driven a taxi for tourists in Kyoto.

According to Guidable Inc., a Tokyo-based staffing services company which introduced Belkouchia to Matsushima Mobility, the number of taxi companies wanting to hire foreign nationals as drivers has been on the rise since around 2022. Guidable has introduced about 40 foreign nationals, including Belkouchia, to about 20 companies.

Guidable President Masaki Tanabe, 38, said, “Because of the shortage and aging of Japanese drivers, the demand for foreign drivers is rising.”