With the COVID-19 pandemic seemingly nowhere near its end, there is a need to shift our mentality from life “after” COVID-19 to one of living “with” COVID-19. Our first online event in the series of the KAS German-Japanese Economic Policy Exchange, “Economic policy in view of a prolonged COVID-19 pandemic: A comparative view of Japanese and German/EU strategies”, will precisely look at this “new normal” from the business angle.

About the webinar

The KAS German-Japanese Economic Policy Exchange series aims to provide an open platform of exchange on economic policy. Important Japanese and German/EU actors in economic policy, from policymakers to representatives of the business sectors, will be invited to openly discuss the challenges and perspectives of their respective economies, achieve a better understanding of each other and enrich the quality of policymaking. The first online event in the series of the KAS German-Japanese Economic Policy Exchange, “Economic policy in view of a prolonged COVID-19 pandemic: A comparative view of Japanese and German/EU strategies”, will look at this “new normal” of life with COVID-19 from the business angle.

The following three areas will form the basis of the exchange:

Lessons learned from previous COVID-19 waves with a focus on the role of digitalisation during the pandemic
The importance of public-private partnership in providing an effective response to the global challenges accelerated by the pandemic
How the EU-Japan Strategic Partnership Agreement can provide solutions to the current challenges faced by businesses

Speakers:

Ichiro Hara (Managing Director, Keidanren (Japan Business Federation))

Wolfgang Niedermark (Member, Executive Board the Federation of German Industries (BDI))

Stefan Berger MEP (Member, European Parliament; Member, Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON); Member, Delegation for relations with Japan)

Hiroshi Ishikawa (Director, Industrial Structural Policy Division, Economic and Industrial Policy Bureau, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Japan)

Moderator: Martin Schulz (Chief Policy Economist, Fujitsu)

etc.

Language: German and Japanese, with English simultaneous interpretation