Japan has started hiring foreign housekeepers for the first time to encourage Japanese housewives to work outside their homes. A scene from "The Housemaid"



By Ko Dong-hwan

Japan has begun hiring foreign housekeepers for the first time ― starting with Filipinos ― in a bid to boost Japanese housewives' re-entry to the workforce.

Housekeeping service providers will start sending the foreigners to designated areas of Kanagawa Prefecture and the city of Osaka as early as March, according to The Japan Times.

The workers must be 18 or over, need at least a year of housekeeping work experience and have basic Japanese language skills. After about 200 hours of training, the housekeepers will help with cooking, laundry, cleaning, shopping and child care (not nursing care, which they are not allowed to do).

About 50 Filipinos are expected to arrive in Japan this month for training and be hired by housekeeping staffing firms and child-care centers, including Duskin, Pasona, Bears and Poppins. Bears reportedly wants to hire 10 to 15 people and Poppins 12.

Major nursing care company Nichiigakkan has applied for 30 additional foreign workers for the summer.

The workers are full-time ― while their Japanese counterparts are part-timers ― and can stay in Japan for up to three years.

Tokyo also has started searching for foreign workers to provide a similar service.

Japan's move comes after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's decision in 2015 to resolve a workforce shortage and change laws that prohibited foreign housekeepers working in Japanese households, except foreign diplomats' homes.