One of the most interesting aspects of the growth in the population of South America is that there are many pockets of Asian communities that have settled on the continent, one of which is a large population of Japanese people in Brazil. Indeed, the population of Japanese Brazilians is so large that it is the largest Japanese community outside Japan itself, with an estimated one and a half million people of Japanese ethnic origin living in Brazil.

This has always been one of the more curious aspects of Brazilian culture for visitors, but the history between the two countries stretches back over a century.

The History Of Japanese Migration To Brazil

The real trigger for the migration to Brazil was the prohibition of slavery, which saw a significant part of the workforce that produced the coffee in the country effectively taken out of the labor pool. This coincided with a period of great poverty in rural Japan, and with a treaty prohibiting Japanese migration to the United States, a treaty was struck between Brazil and Japan to attract migrants to South America.

The first group of 790 migrants arrived in 1908, on a ship known as the Kasato Maru, and while the Japanese as a rule would go on to be laborers on the continent, many of those first migrants were entrepreneurial and successful, and would go on to own coffee plantations. The migration continued to grow until the late 1930s, when the onset of war reduced migration to Brazil, which never really recovered to the same levels afterward.

Japanese Population Centers

By far the largest population of people of Japanese origin is to be found in Sao Paulo, where there are believed to be around seven hundred thousand people of Japanese descent living there. There are plenty of Japanese schools in Sao Paulo too, with an estimated seven thousand students receiving an interesting combination of Japanese and Brazilian education. Other populations around the country are significantly smaller, with the cities of Parana, Pernambuco and Minas Gerais all having over seventy five thousand people of Japanese origin.

The Japanese Culture In Brazil

The strongest influence of Japanese culture in Brazil is definitely found in Sao Paulo, where there is a media community dedicated to serving this population, including two newspapers, the Sao Paulo Shimbun and the Nikkey Shimbun. In the Liberdade district of the city there is also a museum with two floors of exhibits looking at the history of immigration to Brazil from Japan. There are annual festivals held celebrating the cuisine and culture of Japan in the country's main population centers, while there are also other events celebrating the music and dance of Japan too.

The Return Of The Japanese Brazilian Population

One of the interesting aspects of the relationship between the two countries is that there has was a reverse in the immigration in the late twentieth century, as Japan looked to welcome back some of the descendants of those who left for Brazil. The economy in Japan boomed in the 1980s and 1990s, and those returning to Japan were often willing to take the tough and dangerous jobs that many locals didn't want. With immigration rules in Japan designed to give preference to those of Japanese descent, around three hundred thousand Japanese Brazilians returned to Japan.

Influential Japanese Brazilians

Probably the most famous Japanese Brazilian to have made a mark on the world stage is the footballer Deco, whose mother's family was of Japanese descent and his father's family was Brazilian. He became an international footballer representing his adopted country of Portugal, and won the UEFA Champions League with two different clubs. Ruy Ohtake is a famous architect who created some of Sao Paulo's most iconic buildings, while Daniele Suzuki is an actress and TV host who has appeared on national television in Brazil.