The most growth was achieved during the five year period between 1995 and
2000. Our membership made a drastic increase from 10,683 at the end of
1995, to 94,582 at the end of 2000 - a nine-fold increase in five years!
During that time, there were numerous bad debt problems and misconducts
occurring in Japan, and many large banks and securities firms had financial
difficulties and ended up in bankruptcy. From the early '90's until the
beginning of the IT bubble in 1998, the stock market had been crawling
at the bottom and the management of individual assets faced a difficult
time.
Under such circumstances, the drive that created that drastic increase
in membership consisted of two factors. The first was for financial services
institutions to focus on fostering client-first minded, objective financial
planners to gain the trust of their clients. Some institutions offered
to pay tuition and examination fees for their employees to obtain financial
planning credentials, and some offered promotions to employees who obtained
such credentials. The second reason was, with the industry movement and
personnel changes, employees had become actively involved in their personal
skill development through obtaining some type of credentials.
On July 2, 2001, Japan Association for Financial Planners was certified
as a Specified Non-profit Organization by the Cabinet for the purposes of
promoting financial planning to the general public and fostering professional
financial planners, thereby contributing to society as a whole.
One of the two main core activities of the organization is "to promote
financial planning and enlighten the public". In June 2001, a month
before the organization was certified as a Specified Non-profit Organization,
we completed the establishment of chapters in each prefecture that is, we had a specific route to implement public
education activities. We aggressively support chapters' promotional activities for financial planning, and have them offer free seminars and consultation
to the public. We now have "FP Day" once a year as a public education event. Also, at our Tokyo and
Osaka offices, we set up free consultation rooms called "Life and Money Financial Planning Consulting Center ". Further, we published a textbook on financial literacy, targeting
teens. With all these activities we offer, public awareness in financial
planning has been increasing dramatically.
The other main core of our activities is "to foster professional financial
planners". In April 2002, "financial planning profession"
was added under the Skilled Competence Development Act and people who passed
the exam were rated with the government credential: "Certified Skilled Worker of Financial Planning". In June 2002, we were designated by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare as an
examination body for the certification. This is public acknowledgement
by the government of how necessary and beneficial the financial planning
concept is for the public, and further acknowledges the activities of Japan
Association for Financial Planners - a non-government, AFP and CFP® certification body. In addition to the above-mentioned activities, we have
been continuously improving our website for continuing education and practice management education, etc. As a result, membership has been
steadily growing, and our current membership is 180,627 as of 1st September 2010.
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