The Consul-General of Japan Motohiko Kato spoke to the Murfreesboro Rotary Club on Tuesday (9/23/2014), and noted that his office used to be in New Orleans, but was moved to Nashville last October because of the heavy Japanese investments in Tennessee.

To give a feel of the numbers of persons in the Volunteer State who are from Japan, Kato said Murfreesboro has the largest Japanese Supplementary School in the entire state. There are 200 students who attend these special classes each Saturday at MTSU. These youngsters attend public schools on the weekdays.

Kato quipped that he is an Elvis fan, Civil War history buff, and is into country music. He has been with Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs since 1982, and served in Afghanistan, Philippines, Tokyo and New Orleans.

He was quick to point out that good business practices has placed Japan as the world's third largest economy, based on gross domestic product (GD) shares. The United State is dominant in first place. In fact, when you add second place China and third place Japan together, you're still almost 14 per cent below the total US' worldwide GDP.

He also indicated that despite its size, Japan is also the second largest foreign investor in the USA, noting that the United Kingdom was at the top.

Kato told the local Rotarians that because of the strong work ethics here, Japan is investing heavily in this area. He said California had the largest number of Japanese investors, but Tennessee was second.

He noted that for the fourth year, Tennessee ranked first in production of automobiles in the United States. He was proud of Japan's strength in the auto market, but smiled while announcing that 68 percent of the vehicles manufactured by Japanese companies are produced in the US.