Japan Football Association (JFA) signed on a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Confederación Sudamericana de Fútbol (CONMEBOL) on 20 December in Asuncion, Paraguay. This agreement between the two football governing bodies will deepen the mutual relationship and continuous cooperation for further development of football in both CONMEBOL and JFA.

Having visited CONMEBOL President Mr. Alejandro DOMINGUEZ at the headquarters of CONMEBOL, JFA President TASHIMA Kohzo expressed his appreciation for this precious occasion of signing the first MoU between CONMEBOL and JFA. “I am very honoured by this partnership with Confederación Sudamericana de Fútbol. Over the years, we have had many exchanges and deepened our friendship, which has helped us to gain a lot of knowledge and experience from football in South America. This agreement would not only further strengthen our long term friendship, but would also promote exchange on technical and professional areas, such as coach and referee education, as well as youth development. Based on these cooperation, we are looking forward to further enhancing our relationship with the member associations of CONMEBOL, and working together to develop our game and bring our football to the world standard, which we aim at. Our National Team will play against Colombia on the first game at 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia, and Cerezo OSAKA will play against Independiente of Argentina at SURUGA Bank Championship 2018, which will mark its 10th year since the first edition. We trust that through exchanges in many more areas, our teams, players, fans and supporters will further strengthen the friendly relationship and cooperation.”

The MoU between CONMEBOL and JFA agrees on the cooperation with each other in the following areas:

1.Coaching, Referee and Youth Development exchange programmes
2.Mutual participation in competition of youth and other categories
3.Assistance by CONMEBOL to strengthening of the relationship between each Member Associations/Federations of CONMEBOL and JFA

Until today JFA has signed MoU with the following football associations:

Asia
[East] Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Mongolia
[ASEAN] Indonesia, Laos, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam
[South] India
[Central] Iran, Uzbekistan
[West] Jordan, Oman, Qatar, United Arab Emirates

Europe
Denmark, England, France, Germany, and Spain