ITOCHU Corporation (headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Yoshihisa Suzuki, President & COO; hereinafter “ITOCHU”) announced that it has won the Ministerial Award for Women Empowering Companies 2020*, an award given by the Cabinet Office, due to its distinguished achievements.

The award was established by the Cabinet Office for promoting a work environment where women can actively participate and is given to companies that have made distinguished achievements in terms of policy, initiatives and performance related to the promotion of women to executives and managerial positions , and the disclosure of information about them.

ITOCHU got high marks primarily for the following initiatives: (i) support of the career of each woman (ii) support for early return to work from childcare leave, (iii) promotion of a corporate-wide change of the way of working, and (iv) support for each employee working overseas accompanied with only children.

ITOCHU believes that diversity is necessary for the sustainable development of companies and has been promoting and supporting the active participation of diverse human resources since FY2003. ITOCHU continues to give careful support in accordance with each individual's life stage and career. Considering that many women suffer cancer when they are of working age, ITOCHU became among the first companies to introduce a system for supporting treatment and work at the same time. ITOCHU aims to continue to be a company where employees are required to work hard but can have job satisfaction, respecting the lifestyles of each of member its diverse workforce.

■Reference (Japanese only)
・Gender Equality Bureau Cabinet Office
https://www.gender.go.jp/policy/mieruka/company/hyosyo.html
・Japanese Government Internet TV
https://nettv.gov-online.go.jp/prg/prg21799.html?nt=1