Japan's MOF Promotes Bank Note Printing Overseas

Tokyo, Nov. 28 (Jiji Press)--Japan's Ministry of Finance has launched a promotion campaign in the hope of attracting orders to print bank notes for other economies, informed sources told Jiji Press on Thursday. Through the National Printing Bureau, which is under its jurisdiction, the ministry hopes to attract such orders by highlighting Japan's cutting-edge anticounterfeit technologies, the sources said. The ministry is also offering a service for printing passports, the sources said. Currently, the bureau prints Japanese bank notes. In the post-World War II period, Japan printed paper money for South Korea during the Korean War but has no other experience in printing money for other countries. The bureau has set up a sales office to promote its services to governments and central banks overseas. It has sent officials to a number of emerging economies, including Mongolia, Palau and Bhutan, and plans to make sales efforts in other countries, the sources said. The bureau is studying whether there are any plans by other countries to change their bank notes and solicit bids, the sources said. Because Japan changes its bank notes only every 20 years or so, maintaining printing technologies and design skills is a major challenge for the bureau. Overseas orders for bank notes will allow bureau workers to gain more experience in printing money, the sources said. They would also provide the bureau with a new source of revenue, the sources added. Some 100 countries have their bank notes and coins made overseas. Printing companies in Britain and Germany, as well as others such as South Korea's Korea Minting and Security Printing & ID Card Operating Corp., are competing to win orders. The Japan Mint won an order in 2007 to mint coins for New Zealand, the first such order in the postwar period. It has also minted coins for Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Cambodia. END