The Birmingham Committee on Foreign Relations would like to formally invite you to a special event to learn about Alabama's economy and the challenges that face the U.S. and Japan in 2022.
Japanese companies have been a major part of Alabama's economy and as of 2016, there were 140 Japanese companies that contributed a combined $200 million to Alabama's economy. As we enter a new year, we also look to new challenges that the United States and Japan face in a changing Asia as well as reevaluate the role of the US-Japan alliance.
NAJAS is an association of 38 Japan-America societies located across North America that offers public affairs, business, cultural and educational programs about Japan and U.S.-Japan relations to the general public through their member Japan and Japan-America Societies. They are the largest nonprofit supporting a bilateral relationship in the world. The local chapter of NAJAS, The Japan America Society of AL, focuses on promoting personal and professional relationships between American and Japanese people to create a congenial climate for Japanese business in Alabama.
Our speaker, Peter Kelley has been President of NAJAS since 2009. Kelley has extensive experience in the grassroots connections between the United States and Japan in both the private and not-for-profit sectors. From 1985-2003, he worked for Teradyne, Inc., a Boston-based supplier of semiconductor test equipment, spending 5 years each in Japan and Europe and establishing the company's Connection Systems Division in Japan. From 2004-2009, he was Executive Director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute in Cambridge, Mass., an independent foundation dedicated to the promotion of humanities in higher education in Asia. He is a graduate of Harvard College, with a major in East Asian Studies, and the University of Maine School of Law. In 2016, he was awarded a Foreign Minister's Commendation by the government of Japan for his work in support of the commemorations of the 70th Anniversary of the end of the Second World War.
For more information and tickets, visit the event page.
