Today, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo had an introductory call with Minister of Economy, Trade, and Industry of Japan Saito Ken. During their call, Secretary Raimondo expressed her condolences to Japan and the families of the victims of the New Year’s Day Earthquake and reiterated President Biden’s commitment to supporting Japan and the Japanese people to recover from this tragedy. In addition, the two discussed efforts to strengthen bilateral cooperation on supply chain resiliency through the task force for building transparent, resilient, and sustainable supply chains, which was an outcome of the November 2023 Ministerial meeting of the U.S.-Japan Economic Policy Consultative Committee (Economic “2+2”). The two also discussed follow-up from the August 2023 U.S.-Japan-Republic of Korea Trilateral Summit. Lastly, the Secretary thanked the Government of Japan for its continued partnership and leadership in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) and expressed her strong desire to work closely with Minister Saito to operationalize the IPEF Supply Chain Agreement and finalize the Clean Economy and Fair Economy Agreements so that the IPEF partners’ economies can benefit from the economic cooperation under the Framework.