MAFF's Programme for Foreign Culinary Graduates: Hiring Guide

MAFF's Programme for Developing Human Resources to Spread Japanese Food Culture Overseas lets a non-Japanese culinary school graduate stay in Japan up to 5 years (3 without a confectioner's licence) training inside a Japanese restaurant on Designated Activities status. For a restaurant abroad, the one fact that matters is timing: the clock starts when they begin, so ask any candidate on this status when their period ends, and that date is your recruiting window. Once they return to their own country, no work visa is needed to hire them there at all.

1. Who these cooks are, and the date that matters

The programme (日本の食文化海外普及人材育成事業, implementation guidelines adopted 14 February 2014, most recently revised 3 April 2023) lets a foreign graduate of a Japanese cooking or confectionery school stay on Designated Activities status (特定活動) at a restaurant, confectioner or bakery, hotel or ryokan in Japan, employed under a normal employment contract, not as a trainee. Maximum stay is 5 years, or 3 years for someone in the confectionery field without a confectioner's licence (製菓衛生師免許). Pay must be at least what a Japanese national doing the same work would receive, and no more than 3 people per premises can be hosted this way.

Everything else about this scheme is secondary to one operational fact: the person's window in Japan is fixed and known from day one. If a candidate abroad tells you they trained in Japan under this status, ask directly when they started and when their status expires. That answer tells you exactly when they become a free agent in the job market, months in advance, which is more useful than almost anything else on this page.

2. What they can actually do by the time they leave

The host restaurant and the school jointly file a training plan with MAFF, and the plan must cover progression, not repetition: the guideline explicitly bars assigning the person to work that needs no skill or that is learned simply by repeating one task. In practice this means a graduate who completes the full term has moved through prep, cooking stations and, depending on the host, some supervisory exposure, under a plan MAFF has approved and the school audits at least twice a year. That is a meaningfully deeper claim than "worked in a Japanese restaurant for X years" on an ordinary CV, and worth a direct question in interview: which stations, for how long, and under whose supervision.

A returning graduate is not automatically head-chef material. Treat the completed term the way you would treat a strong culinary school placement anywhere: real, supervised, verifiable experience that shortens the runway to a station lead role, not a guarantee of one.

3. How to find them once they head home

• Ask the school directly. Under the guideline, a school must hold or have notified a job placement licence under the Employment Security Act, and it reports to MAFF when a graduate takes up work connected to spreading Japanese food culture after returning home. Schools with a track record of international graduates are the most direct channel; ask their careers office specifically about students on this programme who are approaching the end of their stay.
• Time your outreach to the expiry date. Since the stay is capped at 5 years (3 for unlicensed confectionery staff) from a known start, a school or the graduate themselves can usually tell you months ahead when they become available and whether they plan to return to their home country.
• Check alumni and school networks in the destination country. For the broader picture of which countries send the most international students to Japanese culinary schools, and how to approach a school generally, see recruiting from Japanese culinary schools.
• Confirm the country of work. No visa is needed only when the person works in their own country of nationality (or one where they already hold work rights). If you want them to work in a third country, ordinary work visa rules apply there. See can a restaurant sponsor a chef visa for the country-by-country picture.

4. If your company also has a restaurant in Japan

A restaurant company with locations in Japan and abroad can act as the host in Japan, train a foreign cook there under this programme, and have them join the company's restaurant in their home country once the stay ends. Because the person then works in their own country, no work visa issue arises for that move at all, which removes the cost and lead time that come with sending a Japanese chef abroad instead.

One caution: during the stay, the person's activity is based on the approved training plan in Japan, and whether it is appropriate to make a job after they return home a condition of hosting them needs checking against both the programme's stated purpose and labour law. The safer approach is to respect the person's freedom to choose their own job and simply make the option visible: a place to work if they choose to return home to it.

5. The host side, in brief

This section only applies to a business with a location in Japan willing to act as host; a restaurant abroad with no Japan presence cannot take part directly.

• Host and school must jointly file a training plan with MAFF, as a rule at least one month before the current stay period expires, covering training content, housing, home-leave arrangements, an instructor and a daily-life adviser, and financial capacity to pay wages and enrol the person in labour and social insurance.
• The school assesses progress at least once a year and audits the host at least twice a year, reporting to the regional immigration bureau.
• From October 2026, MAFF is retiring its eMAFF online application channel (closing February 2027); all applications and reports must use Word-format forms sent to a designated email address, with attachments converted to PDF and zipped. A host in Japan should check MAFF's page for the current process before filing anything.

Full detail on hosting requirements sits with MAFF's own published guideline, linked below; we do not repeat the complete text here since it applies only to the Japan-side host, not to the restaurant abroad reading this page.

6. Points to watch

• We found no published participant numbers. MAFF does not publish how many people are currently hosted under this programme or how many complete it each year (checked 27 September 2026). Treat the size of this pool as unknown, and do not build a hiring plan that depends on a specific volume of candidates.
• Not limited to Japanese cuisine. The programme covers cooking, confectionery and baking generally. Confirm a candidate's actual kitchen assignment was Japanese cuisine, not confectionery or a Western kitchen.
• Returning home is the person's choice. Some switch to a different residence status and stay in Japan; some move to a third country instead of their own. Do not assume the end of the stay means they are coming to you.
• It differs from Specified Skilled Worker (food service) mainly in purpose. Specified Skilled Worker exists to fill labour shortages in Japan and requires passing a skills and Japanese-language test; this programme exists to train people who will leave Japan again. A CV mentioning either scheme is worth a direct question about which one, and for how long.
• It can strengthen a certification claim. Under MAFF's cooking skill certification, graduates of a designated Japanese training facility skip the Bronze prerequisite for Silver, and time at a Japanese restaurant in Japan counts towards the Silver and Gold experience requirement, so a returning graduate is often well placed to sit for the higher tiers.

This article is general information, not immigration or employment advice. Details of the programme were checked against MAFF's published materials as of 27 September 2026. Before hiring or hosting anyone, confirm the latest information with MAFF, the relevant school, and a qualified professional.