National Safety Day

What Is National Safety Day?

Every July 1st is "National Safety Day" (国民安全の日, Kokumin Anzen no Hi) in Japan. Established by Cabinet approval on May 6, 1960, at a time when industrial accidents and traffic accidents were rising sharply, the day promotes a national movement for safety in every part of life, from workplaces and roads to fire prevention. July 1 was reportedly chosen because the Industrial Accident Prevention Council (set up in 1959) usually issued its recommendations around that date. The day is also the first day of "National Safety Week" (全国安全週間, Zenkoku Anzen Shūkan, July 1–7), a workplace-safety campaign led by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare and the Japan Industrial Safety and Health Association that dates back to 1928. Around this time, the Prime Minister also presents awards to people and organizations that have contributed to accident prevention.

Japan's Workplace Safety Record

Japan has made remarkable progress in reducing workplace fatalities and injuries since the postwar era. In the early 1960s, during the high-growth period, industrial accidents claimed more than 6,000 workers' lives per year. Through sustained regulatory effort, technological improvement, and cultural emphasis on safety management, that figure has been reduced to under 1,000 annual fatalities in recent years — a dramatic improvement even as the workforce has grown. National Safety Day and Safety Week are part of the institutional framework that sustains this safety culture.

Traffic Safety

National Safety Day also incorporates traffic safety awareness, promoting seat belt use, pedestrian safety, and safe driving habits. Japan has achieved extraordinary reductions in traffic fatalities from a peak of nearly 17,000 deaths in 1970 to 2,547 in 2025, the lowest figure since records began in 1948 — a decline driven by road engineering improvements, vehicle safety standards, law enforcement, and sustained public education campaigns.

Safety Culture in Japanese Industry

Japanese manufacturing is known for its attention to safety management. Toyota's production system, for example, lets any worker stop the line when something abnormal is found. The familiar slogan "anzen dai ichi" (安全第一, safety first) itself came from the United States: in the early 1900s, U.S. Steel changed its policy to "safety first, quality second, production third," and the phrase later spread around the world, including to Japanese worksites. National Safety Day reinforces this culture of constant vigilance and continuous improvement in safety practices.

Fun Facts

• Industrial accident rate: Work-related deaths in Japan have fallen from over 6,000 a year in the early 1960s to well under 1,000 today, thanks to decades of safety engineering, worker training, and regulation.
• Pointing and calling: Japanese worksites are known for "pointing and calling" (指差し呼称, yubisashi koshō): workers point at what they are checking and say it out loud. A Railway Technical Research Institute experiment is often cited as showing that this cut errors to about one-sixth.