{"id":179849,"date":"2026-09-17T11:43:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T02:43:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/?post_type=news&#038;p=179849&#038;lang=en"},"modified":"2026-09-17T11:43:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T02:43:14","slug":"oita-expands-multilingual-support-for-foreign-residents","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/en\/news\/oita-expands-multilingual-support-for-foreign-residents\/","title":{"rendered":"Oita expands multilingual support for foreign residents"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Oita Prefecture will place foreign-resident support coordinators at five regional offices from Oct. 1. Each coordinator will speak at least three languages. The prefecture has about 23,000 foreign residents, 1.7 times the number in 2019. Existing prefectural and municipal consultation services operate at only five locations, and a prefectural survey found that roughly half of respondents faced problems such as language barriers or not knowing where to seek advice. Governor Sato said the prefecture would pursue measures that allow foreign residents and local communities to live together with peace of mind. <strong>Source:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/newsdig.tbs.co.jp\/articles\/-\/2939021?display=1\" target=\"_blank\">OBS News<\/a> \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/oita-pref.stream.jfit.co.jp\/?tpl=play_vod&#038;inquiry_id=1887\" target=\"_blank\">Oita Prefectural Assembly (from 4:44 to 7:29)<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/fnn_oita-city-center-view_2026_WEB.jpeg?resize=1400%2C1050&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"1400\" height=\"1050\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-175932\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/fnn_oita-city-center-view_2026_WEB.jpeg?w=1400&amp;ssl=1 1400w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/fnn_oita-city-center-view_2026_WEB.jpeg?resize=300%2C225&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/fnn_oita-city-center-view_2026_WEB.jpeg?resize=1024%2C768&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/fnn_oita-city-center-view_2026_WEB.jpeg?resize=768%2C576&amp;ssl=1 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><br \/>\nPhoto: Fukuoka Now <\/p>\n<p>Get Fukuoka and Kyushu\u2019s top stories delivered to your inbox. The Now is Fukuoka Now\u2019s free biweekly newsletter featuring local news, events, culture, business, and community updates in English. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/en\/mailmagazine\/\">Subscribe to The Now<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Summaries based on public content, errors may occur during translation. Images credited independently. Send feedback using <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/en\/contact\/\">this <strong>form<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oita Prefecture will place foreign-resident support coordinators at five regional offices from Oct. 1. Each coordinator will speak at least three languages. The prefecture has&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30292,"featured_media":175932,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","tags":[],"class_list":["post-179849","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","location-oita-prefecture","news-category-general","en-US"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/179849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179849"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}