American Chamber President : Official Says U.S.-Japan Trade Gap Will Worsen
The president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan predicted Friday that a “persistent rise in the U.S. trade deficit with Japan will continue.” He criticized American businessmen and the U.S. government for failing to take steps to correct the imbalance.
At the chamber’s annual membership meeting, Herbert F. Hayde summed up a year of efforts aimed at solving U.S.-Japan trade problems. And he faulted Japan’s Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone as well as the Americans, saying that a series of market-opening moves that Nakasone announced in April “failed to produce the results the U.S. Congress desires.”
But he also praised Nakasone for taking “major steps to ensure transparency in (Japanese) rule making and the decision-making process,” and he added: “Foreign voices are now being heard and are being taken seriously.”
Hayde offered qualified praise for a so-called action program, announced by Nakasone on July 30, that is aimed at simplifying Japanese standards and certification procedures. But he said that American businessmen will have to see the details, which have not been spelled out, before they “can really appreciate what amount of business (the program) will generate.”
Hayde, who is chairman of Burroughs Corp. Japan, made the statements in his annual report to the chamber, which plays a major role as a conduit for U.S. businessmen’s complaints to the Japanese government and suggestions to the American government. He expressed doubt that the 14% increase in the Japanese yen’s value since Sept. 22 would continue.
In New York on Friday, the dollar fell to 208.59 yen. It was the first time it has closed below 210 yen since March 31, 1981.
Appreciation of the yen’s value, which cuts into the yen profits that Japanese manufacturers receive from sales of their products for dollars, will have to go much further to reduce Japan’s exports to the United States, he said. “American buyers aren’t going to turn off overnight because the product costs 10% more,” Hayde said.
Shortly before Hayde spoke, the U.S. Commerce Department announced in Washington that the United States experienced a record one-month trade deficit of $5.1 billion with Japan in September. That brought the American bilateral deficit for the first nine months of 1985 to $36.8 billion, only $100 million less than in all of 1984.
Hayde chided American businessmen for failing to take advantage of new opportunities to sell goods to the Japanese government.
“When I saw the list of American companies registered to participate in the (government) procurement process, I was appalled to learn that the majority of the American businesses in Japan were not registered,” he said.
