Japan pledged to promote "offer-based" development assistance instead of waiting for developing countries to request such funding in its annual economic aid policy document released on Tuesday.
The white paper on development cooperation, released by the Foreign Ministry, pledged to "persistently improve" the official development assistance system by combining the more proactive aid approach with its traditional request-based method.
The government adopted a new approach after updating the Development Cooperation Charter policy guideline last June, marking its first revision since 2015, in response to China's increased economic clout in the developing world through investment.
Building a peaceful, stable and prosperous international community is "directly linked to Japan's national interests," and the role that development assistance should play has become "increasingly more important," the document said.
In the paper, Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa said Tokyo will use foreign aid as one of its "most important diplomatic tools," aiming to realize a free and open Indo-Pacific in an apparent counter to China's increasing presence in the region. Beijing's economic and military assertiveness has increased tensions between the two countries.
Kamikawa also vowed to keep supporting reconstruction work in Ukraine, which has been under a Russian invasion since February 2022, while pointing to the importance of collaborating with private firms and attracting investment.
The white paper said Japan's 2022 foreign aid, calculated by international standards under the grant equivalent system, fell 0.8 percent from 2021 to about $17.50 billion, mainly due to the weaker yen against the U.S. dollar.
It was the first decrease since the current calculation method was introduced in 2018. The yen-based figure was up 18.8 percent to 2.30 trillion yen ($15.6 billion) in 2022, reflecting various support measures for Ukraine that year.
Among the nations of the 32-member Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's Development Assistance Committee, Japan remained the third-largest aid provider for the year, following the United States and Germany.
