10 years of naturalization statistics
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| Source: MoJ Nationality Department |
The above graph shows the amount of people that apply for Japanese naturalization every year, over the last ten years. The "applicants" gray background total for each year is not equal to the total of accepted and denied for every year because sometimes the acceptance or denial is not decided for an applicant until the next year.
The green "accepted" data is the sum of the ROK & DPRK, the PRC, and other nationalities. The red "denied" includes people from all nationalities.
The Koreas and the Chinese comprise the vast majority of the applicants for Japanese nationality. So much so that all the other countries (such as Brazil, the U.K., the U.S.) are all lumped together into the category "other", which is dwarfed by the Republic of Korea, the People's Democratic Republic of Korea, and the People's Republic of China. Taiwan is counted as "other".
Denials of applications have remained steady through the decade with only a couple hundred per year. In other words, over 99% of applications are approved. The statistics do not show how many people "abort" an application. That is, begin talking to a nationality case worker and give up before submitting a completed application.
Through the last decade, the numbers have pretty much held steady, plus or minus a thousand or so, with the exception of the Koreans, which has been declining. However, the last two years were big exceptions due to extraordinary historical events:
- 2010 felt the after-effects of the global Great Recession in the Japanese economy, which started in 2009 in America and started to be really felt in terms of jobs in that year in Japan.
- 2011 was the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. My source in the nationality department confirmed that a large number of potential candidates withdrew their naturalization application after the disaster. They do not know if they stayed in Japan or went back to their countries.
