<P> During the 1950s, Japanese export products had a reputation for poor quality . However, this image changed dramatically during the 1970s . Japanese steel, ships, watches, television receivers, automobiles, semiconductors, and many other goods developed a reputation for being manufactured to high standards and under strict quality control . The Japanese were the acknowledged world leaders for quality and design in the 1980s for some of these products . This rise in product quality also increased demand for Japanese exports . </P> <P> The push behind Japan's exports came from manufacturers . Many recognized that to reach efficient levels of production they needed to adopt a global approach . Manufacturers concentrated on the domestic market (often protected from foreign products) until they reached internationally competitive levels and domestic markets were saturated . Often helped by the large general trading companies, manufacturers aggressively attacked foreign markets when they felt able to compete globally . This push factor partially accounted for the extraordinarily high level of export growth in the 1970s, when the domestic economy slowed; increasing exports was a way for manufacturers to continue expanding despite the more sluggish domestic market . Japanese manufacturers were part of larger conglomerates, the zaibatsu, which provided financing of activities . Thus, they could concentrate on gaining high market shares, without the need to achieve high profits in the process . </P> <P> Exports included a wide variety of products, virtually all of which were processed to some degree . After the war, the composition of exports shifted through technological progression . Primary products, light manufactures, and crude items, which predominated during the 1950s, were gradually eclipsed by heavy industrial goods, complex machinery and equipment, and consumer durables, which required large capital investments and advanced technology to produce . This process was illustrated vividly in the case of textiles, which composed more than 30% of Japanese exports in 1960, but less than 3% by 1988 . Iron and steel products, which had grown rapidly in the 1960s to become nearly 15% of exports by 1970, declined to less than 6% of exports by 1988 . Over the same period, however, exports of motor vehicles rose from under 2% to over 18% of the total . In 1991 Japan's major exports were motor vehicles, office machinery, scientific and optical equipment, and semiconductors and other electronic components . </P> <P> After the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster in 2011 concerns were expressed about the safety of Japanese food exports . Factory output was also badly affected by power supply problems. (1) </P>

When did japan begin to trade with other countries