On March 7 (local time), JAL and the Japan-America Society of Hawaii (JASH) held a signing ceremony for the Partnership Collaboration Agreement in preparation for the “2nd Hawaii – Japan Sister State and Sister City Summit” scheduled to take place in May 2026.
In the past, each of the Hawaiian islands had established sister city relationships with prefectures and cities in Japan by visiting both countries independently. The first summit was held in July 2023. The first summit brought together representatives from 22 local governments, including the governor of Hawaii, cities and towns, and prefectures and municipalities, to exchange views on education, sustainable tourism, the economy, and other issues.
However, JASH does not have a base in Japan, and there remained some issues that JAL, which has a network throughout Japan, could not handle for the first attempt of this magnitude, so JAL, which has a history of more than 70 years since it started international flights to and from Hawaii in 1954, joined in for the second round. The company’s participation is expected to deepen the relationship between Japan and Hawaii and further expand exchanges between the two countries.
Through this partnership agreement, JAL will serve as the JASH office in Japan, and will also work to deepen horizontal exchanges between municipalities that already have sister city relationships with Hawaii and to expand these relationships so that new sister cities will be born. As of February 2025, there are 34 Japanese municipalities that have sister city relationships with Hawaii.
The signing ceremony was attended by Ms. Kaori Nishiharaguchi, Executive Officer and Deputy General Manager of Solution Sales Division from JAL, and Ms. Karen Knudsen, Board Chair from JASH, who signed the agreement.
Mr. Nishiharaguchi said, “For the 34 sister city municipalities, we have branches all over Japan. We have raised our hand in the belief that we can become a bridge between Japan and Hawaii through the cooperation of our branches, which are rooted and nurtured in the local communities in each area. We believe that we can help strengthen the ties between our two countries,” he said, expressing his hope that the partnership agreement will further promote friendship and mutual understanding.
Takehisa Sekiya, General Manager of the Relationship and Connection Creation Department of JAL’s Solution Sales Division, who attended the signing ceremony, said, “JAL and Hawaii have a history of more than 70 years, but the Corona disaster brought the flow of people to a halt once. When we thought about how to bring this back, we focused on the “strong” relationship we have as sister cities. The sister city relationship originally started with the idea of “getting to know each other,” so during the next year (when the summit will be held), there should be an increase in dialogue with local governments about what they will do before and after the summit, and what they would like to do in Hawaii. We hope that this will spark outbound travel from Japan,” she said.
© Source travel watch
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