ID :
158450
Sun, 01/30/2011 - 15:13
Auther :
Shortlink :
https://www.oananews.org//node/158450
The shortlink copeid
JICA organizes overseas tours to brush up image
DACCA, Jan. 30 Kyodo - The Japan International Cooperation Agency is organizing group tours to visit its overseas activities apparently in a bid to brush up its image following a sharp rebuke from Japan's administrative reformers that its work does not reflect the needs of developing countries.
The first trip will be a weeklong tour of Bangladesh in March, local JICA sources said Sunday.
JICA, as the overseas volunteers agency is better known, has been active overseas since the mid-1960s.
A total of 33,000 JICA volunteers have worked in some 80 countries, usually for two-year stints in a variety of fields such as farming, public health, education and sports.
As part of Japan's administrative review, administrative reformers under the government of Prime Minister Naoto Kan concluded last November that JICA's overseas activities do not reflect local needs and ordered the agency to review its operations.
JICA, which currently has 80 volunteers working in Bangladesh, is working with the Japanese travel agency H.I.S. in offering the overseas tours, the first planned for March 5 to 11.
JICA sources said participants in the tour will have an opportunity to visit slums in the Bangladesh capital Dacca and talk with Japanese volunteer teachers and local students in the southern port city of Barisal and other JICA operation sites.
The Bangladesh tour is priced at about 160,000 yen.
JICA also plans to arrange five or six such tours a year to other destinations, targeting youth and elderly Japanese who might be interested to work as JICA volunteers, the sources said.
The first trip will be a weeklong tour of Bangladesh in March, local JICA sources said Sunday.
JICA, as the overseas volunteers agency is better known, has been active overseas since the mid-1960s.
A total of 33,000 JICA volunteers have worked in some 80 countries, usually for two-year stints in a variety of fields such as farming, public health, education and sports.
As part of Japan's administrative review, administrative reformers under the government of Prime Minister Naoto Kan concluded last November that JICA's overseas activities do not reflect local needs and ordered the agency to review its operations.
JICA, which currently has 80 volunteers working in Bangladesh, is working with the Japanese travel agency H.I.S. in offering the overseas tours, the first planned for March 5 to 11.
JICA sources said participants in the tour will have an opportunity to visit slums in the Bangladesh capital Dacca and talk with Japanese volunteer teachers and local students in the southern port city of Barisal and other JICA operation sites.
The Bangladesh tour is priced at about 160,000 yen.
JICA also plans to arrange five or six such tours a year to other destinations, targeting youth and elderly Japanese who might be interested to work as JICA volunteers, the sources said.
