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[Provisional Translation]

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe jointly held the 10th meeting in FY2016 of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, and the 28th meeting of the Industrial Competitiveness Council, at the Prime Minister’s Office.

At the meeting, the Basic Policies for Economic and Fiscal Management and Reform 2016, and the 2016 revision of the Japan Revitalization Strategy were discussed.

Based on the discussion, the Prime Minister said,

“I would like to express my heartfelt thanks today for your efforts in compiling the Basic Policies 2016 and the Japan Revitalization Strategy 2016.

World leaders at the G7 Ise-Shima Summit and I shared the sentiment that the economies of emerging countries and developing countries are slowing and the global economy is faced with major risk. It is based on this awareness that we agreed to commit to reinforce our efforts to address the current economic situation by taking all appropriate policy responses in a timely manner in order to avoid falling into another crisis, which is clearly stipulated in the G7 Ise-Shima Leaders’ Declaration.

As the President of the G7 Ise-Shima Summit, Japan must mobilize all measures and means in order to take the lead in contributing to the global economy, which includes accelerating the pace of structural reform and deploying fiscal stimulus.

To powerfully accelerate Abenomics, I would like to implement comprehensive and bold economic policies this autumn. Additionally, I determined that we should postpone raising the consumption tax to 10% by 30 months until October 2019 to prevent a stall in domestic demand.

However, I will not lower the flag of fiscal rehabilitation. There is no change in the basic policy that there can be no fiscal soundness without economic revitalization. I plan on firmly maintaining our goal to achieve fiscal soundness by FY2020. I would like the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy to decisively move forward with reform in terms of spending and income while also further accelerating measures to escape deflation and revitalize the economy.

At the same time, we will work directly on the structural issues of a declining population and the declining birthrate and aging population, which are a fundamental cause of the bottleneck hindering economic growth, in an effort to create a society in which all citizens are dynamically engaged. I hope to realize the desires of everyone in Japan while leveraging the positive achievements of Abenomics.

As the second stage of the growth strategy, we will unearth latent demand and create promising growth markets through joint public-private efforts. First, we will continually reform regulations and legislation. I believe that we must reform our approach to decision making, moving away from the conventional approach of making decisions when absolutely necessary, and instead make decisions ahead of time with an understanding of what is to come. We will also develop the human resources who will help Japan come out on top in a new era. The Fourth Industrial Revolution Public-Private Council will take the lead as a new control tower, giving priority to the fourth industrial revolution.

The positive cycle of growth and distribution born from these efforts will be expanded to every corner of Japan in an effort to achieve the largest GDP in postwar history of 600 trillion yen. Therefore, we must deepen the Basic Policies and the Growth Strategy, which form the engine powering Abenomics. I ask that Minister Ishihara and relevant ministers work together for the formulation of these policies.

The specialist committee to be set up under the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy and the Council for Science, Technology and Innovation which was proposed today represents a new initiative seeking to solve the important issues facing Japan by working with the control tower of economic and fiscal policy and science and technology policy. I ask that Minister Ishihara and Minister Shimajiri work together to deepen discussions on this matter.

I would like to once again extend my thanks to the many efforts and hard work of council members in today’s compilation. I will exert my best efforts to fully accelerate Abenomics and achieve the promised targets. Thank you.”