Outline

GSFS FRONTRUNNERS

Contributing to International Cooperation in Southeast Asia

“I Enjoy Working in JICA”

At the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), I belong to a Southeast Asia and Pacific Department. I am in charge of agriculture, economic development, and governance programs of both Cambodia and Laos. I supervise many programs in those countries; collect information, coordinate teams for cooperation and discuss matters not only with the staff of the JICA, but also both the Japanese national government and the government of the respective country. I have been interested in the international situation since I was a child. Consequently, I completed a master’s degree hoping to devote myself to international cooperation. I enjoy my work with which I can directly address and treat issues, and, every single day, I am content with the feeling that I am contributing to both countries’ long-term development., Meanwhile, since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the JICA allowed the staff to work from home. Thanks to this flexible treatment, I can better manage my work and child rearing every day.
My graduate studies are essential in my current work. There was a Cambodian student in the same laboratory and this encounter fostered my interest in Cambodia. Naturally, I wrote my thesis on Cambodia both in the master’s and the doctoral courses.
Simultaneously, when I entered the doctoral course, I was sent to Cambodia as a member of a NPO and supported victims of human trafficking. Both my graduate studies and this experience allowed me to deepen my career. My knowledge of Cambodian government and cultural understanding are my great advantage to do this job

Message to Younger Students

It took me nine years to complete my doctoral dissertation because after the stay in Thailand, I had my two children to raise and had to move due to my husband’s job transfers. During this period, I often felt discouraged to continue writing the thesis, but every time I experienced these difficulties my friends and acquaintances from the graduate school encouraged me. Finally, I could complete writing it. Until recently, it was difficult to build a stable carrier, considering that I had to move many times, but I am now approaching my childhood dream with support and advice from many people I know from the graduate school. I am grateful for the relationships that I developed while I was in the Graduate School of Frontier Sciences. I am still struggling to manage my workand child raising simultaneously and have not found the best solution for it yet; however, if you are also a mother like me, here is my message. Let’s believe that we have a bright future ahead of us if we just keep going at our own pace without giving up.

I visited Cambodia three times with my children for my field work to write the doctoral thesis. Every visit, I found significant progress in Cambodia; however, there were also many unchanged things. I hope my children learned a lot from these visits.

I visited Kagawa Prefecture in May 2022. Field surveys make me understand the problems more deeply.

Maki Kozakai
Country Officer

2021 Became a country officer at JICA
2020 Obtained a doctoral degree from Department of International Studies, Graduate School of Frontier Sciences
2018 Worked as a Project Academic Specialist at Institute for Future Initiatives of the University of Tokyo
2016 Completed the required doctoral coursework from the Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, the University of Tokyo after fulfilling the course study
2012 Worked for the support project for flood victims at Habitat for Humanities (NPO) in Thailand
2010 Graduated from the master’s course of Graduate School of Frontier Sciences and started work for NPO, Kokkyo naki Kodomotachi (KnK) in Cambodia

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