Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism will focus on promoting Japan’s Super Express Railway, the Shinkansen System to increase its application to overseas high-speed rail plans, appealing its technical advantages such as civil structure standards and maintenance methods. Shinkasen’s high-level safety will be advertised worldwide based on the comparative research with other systems including Europe’s high speed trains. The Ministry intends to help Japanese companies participate in overseas projects on the assumption that several countries in Asia and Europe have plans in pipeline to develop high speed rails.

The overseas market of high speed rails is predicted to increase to 1.6 trillion yen by 2020 from 2007 level of 1.1 billion yen. While European countries aim at international standardization of their technology, China and South Korea publicize their cost reduction ability. On the other hand, the Shinkansen’s safety proved by the fatal accident-free operation since 1964 is considered Japan’s biggest advantage and the government wishes to win contracts over other powerful competitors in the global market. (2013/12/11)