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U.S.-Japan Common Agenda Fact sheet released by the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs U.S. Department of State, June 26, 2000

In 1993, President Clinton and then Prime Minister Miyazawa initiated the U.S.-Japan Common Agenda in Global Perspective. It was established as a framework to guide our joint efforts to address the growing challenge of global issues, taking advantage of the expertise and resources of the two largest economies in the world. Common Agenda initiatives have produced substantive results in the four areas our leaders identified as top priority: Promoting Health and Human Development; Protecting the Global Environment; Advancing Science and Technology; and Responding to Challenges to Global Stability.

Joint U.S.-Japanese efforts under the Common Agenda have led in many areas to broader and more intensified efforts by the international community to address the enormous challenges we face. One of the most important achievements has been the creation of new links and understanding among officials in our governments, business people, and NGO's under the Public Private Partnership.

Under the Common Agenda, the U.S. and Japan have launched joint conservation efforts in Indonesia and the Philippines. Together with other international partners, we have galvanized world support for the International Coral Reef Initiative, a program aimed at protecting and conserving these valuable marine resources, and are helping to establish the International Coral Reef Center in Palau. On the health front, our two governments are working through longstanding programs to eradicate polio worldwide by the year 2002. And we are working closely on combating HIV/AIDS in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The U.S. and Japan are also working together to improve forecasting and warning of natural disasters, and to mitigate their effects on populations.

At the February 2000 Common Agenda Plenary in Tokyo, the U.S. and Japan jointly announced progress on the following joint initiatives: ARGO Global Ocean Observation Program; Integrated Ocean Drilling Program; Child and Maternal Health; Infectious Diseases, Including HIV/AIDS; Population and Health in Bangladesh; and Counter-narcotics Projects in Southeast Asia.

For seven years, the Common Agenda has been both a symbol of our two countries' shared values and a concrete commitment to improving the lives not only of our populations, but of the world.

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