News

To ensure the safety of its employees, the Kuraray Group is taking action in line with statements from the Japanese government as well as the Company’s own crisis management standards, announcing security threat levels for each region while overseeing the approval/denial of employee applications for business travel.

(1) Generally prohibiting international business travel between certain countries (the expansion of the scope of prohibited regions)
To date, Kuraray has enforced a general rule prohibiting business travel to mainland China (excluding Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan) by Group employees stationed in Japan and other countries. At the same time, Kuraray has likewise banned business travel from mainland China to elsewhere in the world. However, in light of the growing number of cases of infection in Japan, Asia and Oceania, Kuraray decided to expand the regional scope of its business travel ban, announcing the prohibition of international business trips between India and any Asian country east of India (including Japan) as well as Oceania.

(2) Imposing restrictions on business travel in Japan (the general prohibition of business travel between domestic bases of operations and the voluntary restraint of visits to business partners)
･In Japan, Kuraray has made it a rule to replace all meetings that involve the attendance of employees from multiple bases of operations with on-line meetings via the utilization of teleconferencing systems and other methods. Reflecting the introduction of this rule, domestic business travel between the Tokyo Head Office, the Osaka Office and plants is generally prohibited.
･Moreover, all domestic employees are asked to refrain from paying non-essential or non-urgent visits to business partners and other external counterparts.

(3) Voluntarily refraining from hosting and participating in events
･Kuraray and all of its business units voluntarily refrain from hosting events as part of countermeasures aimed at mitigating the risk of infection.
･Kuraray employees are asked to voluntarily refrain from participating in any external events.

(4) Expanding the scope of eligible employees who can utilize flexible-commuting and telecommuting programs
With the aim of mitigating the risk of infection, Kuraray has relaxed the conditions under which employees are deemed eligible for flexible-commuting and telecommuting programs and is promoting the use of such programs.

We will continue to gather information from various sources and swiftly implement countermeasures as needed in response to the situation.