``Expanding foreign direct investment is an important agenda item for Japan,’’ Nukaga, who will leave to the Middle East tonight and return on July 21, said at a press conference today. He added that he wants to have ``aggressive’’ discussions to promote investment from Middle Eastern nations.

Energy-producing nations are awash with cash reaped from the 58 percent increase in crude oil prices this year. Foreign- direct investment in Japan is less than a quarter of the U.S. and not even a third of that in South Korea.

Foreign direct investment in Japan was about 3 percent of gross domestic product at the end of 2007, according to the Cabinet Office. The figure compared with 45 percent in England, 14 percent in the U.S. and 8.8 percent in South Korea. Japan is struggling to attract more funds into what European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson in April called the developed world’s ``most closed’’ market.

Sovereign wealth funds, state-sponsored pools from governments including the United Arab Emirates, invested $58 billion in the first quarter, more than they spent from 2000 to 2005, according to a report by Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Grail Research, a unit of consulting firm Monitor Group.

Executives from Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Mizuho Corporate Bank Ltd., Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., Nomura Asset Management Co. and other companies will also attend the trip, Nukaga said.

Nukaga said he also wants to discuss ``supply conditions of resources and movements in the markets’’ on his visit in light of the impact higher energy costs have on Japan and the global economy.