Japan Irked at New Role as S. Africa’s Top Trade Partner : Government Asks Exporters to Exercise Self-Restraint

Japan takes quiet pride in being No. 1 on many economic fronts, but there is one distinction that officials here say they would have preferred to forgo--overtaking the United States as South Africa’s top trading partner.

With the South African government’s latest crackdown on dissent drawing heightened international attention to Pretoria, the Japanese government is renewing its call for self-restraint among large exporters and trading companies.

“We’re going to try to convince them to do something by themselves,” said Yoshifumi Matsuda, the Foreign Ministry’s director general of public information and cultural affairs.

Matsuda concedes that the government has no legal influence on the private sector. A recent policy dispute here between the Foreign Ministry and the powerful Ministry of International Trade and Industry has sent mixed signals to industry, and it remains unclear to what extent the appeal for restraint will be heeded.

Foreign Minister Sosuke Uno issued a statement Thursday expressing “strong regret” to the South African government over its decision to ban anti-apartheid organizations. Uno also said he would meet with leaders of the Japan Federation of Economic Organizations to urge again that they curb trade with South Africa.

‘Statistical Problem’

The chairman of the federation, the most influential of Japan’s industrial interest groups, has nominally endorsed the Foreign Ministry position. At the same time, however, a spokesman for the federation argues that there has been no worrisome change in Japan-South Africa trade and contradicts the posture of compliance with the Foreign Ministry.

“It’s a statistical problem relating to the high yen,” federation spokesman Kokichi Morimoto said. “We don’t think the trade itself has increased significantly, so we don’t really think restraint is necessary.”

In dollar terms, trade between Japan and South Africa increased by 19% in 1987 to a total $4.27 billion. This compares to an estimated $2.5 billion for U.S. trade with South Africa. But the trend is somewhat more ambiguous when statistics are calculated in yen, showing a 2% annual increase to 620 billion yen in two-way trade last year. Trade had declined slightly in yen terms in the previous two years.

Morimoto’s views are similar to those initially expressed by officials of the Trade Ministry when the trade statistics were made public last month. The Trade Ministry’s laissez-faire approach to the matter quickly clashed with the Foreign Ministry’s desire to intervene. The two rival agencies apparently patched up their differences, however, when Trade Minister Hajime Tamura announced that he was backing the call for self-restraint.

Japanese sanctions against South Africa are already among the strongest imposed by advanced nations, according to the Foreign Ministry’s Matsuda. Japan banned direct investment in South Africa two decades ago and in recent years restricted imports of iron and steel and blocked the export of computers that could end up in the hands of the South African police. Cultural and sports exchanges have been halted.

Still, the Japanese trade with South Africa remains conspicuous, especially after U.S. economic sanctions have cut down on American trade. Japan is in the awkward position of seeming to fill a vacuum, an appearance that has drawn condemnation from abroad. On Wednesday, the black caucus in the U.S. Congress delivered a letter protesting Japan’s South Africa trade to Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita.

Also this week, an organization in Tokyo calling itself the Japan Anti-Apartheid Committee started a domestic campaign to boycott imported South African products, such as apple juice, canned peaches and diamonds. But imports actually declined last year by 8% in yen terms, while exports increased by 18%.

Automobiles and parts for assembly kits commonly called “knock-down sets,” which are assembled in South Africa, accounted for about 40% of those exports.

Shoichiro Toyoda, president of Toyota Motor and head of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Assn., told Japanese reporters a week ago that the auto industry plans to exercise self-restraint in the future. A spokesman for Toyota said Thursday, however, that he could not immediately comment on exports to South Africa because the company’s policy was not clearly established.