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On October 23, 2020, the Prime Minister held the 15th meeting of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy in 2020 at the Prime Minister’s Office.

At the meeting, the participants engaged in discussions on creating flows of people to rural areas and accelerating digitization.

Following the discussions, the Prime Minister said,

“Today, we discussed two extremely important points as issues for post-corona Japan – accelerating digitization and creating new flows of people.

First, we must resume the movement of people, which has been temporarily suspended, and make a breakthrough of growth by creating new flows of people, such as from urban areas to rural areas, between different companies, even small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and startups. I believe we could lever that with the digitalization in public and private sectors.

I ask Minister Hirai to make the necessary arrangements to correct the ministries and agencies’ practices of developing systems separately and advance government-wide digitization from next fiscal year. Furthermore, based on the views presented today by the private sector members, I ask Minister Hirai to expedite the coordination with the relevant ministers to give the agency in charge of digital transformation, which will be established next year, firm authority to undertake digital transformation responsibly within the national government, local authorities, and the private sector.

Also, I ask Minister Kono to get rid of regulations and leverage digitization for regional revitalization and economic growth. In particular, I ask Minister Kono to expedite the coordination with the relevant ministers on such matters as expanding distance learning and accelerating the review process for cutting-edge medical devices.

In addition to them, I ask Minister Tamura to review rules for employing workers that respond to new ways of working, including teleworking, second jobs, and dual employment, by the end of this year.

I believe that what is important for the Suga Cabinet is adapting to the speed of change and undertaking reforms from the people’s standpoint. I request the Government to work as one on these reforms, without falling prey to sectionalism.”