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On December 1, 2020, the Prime Minister held the fifth meeting of the Committee on the Growth Strategy at the Prime Minister’s Office.

At the meeting, the participants engaged in a discussion on the draft action plan.

Following the discussion, the Prime Minister said,

“Today, we finalized the action plan for the Growth Strategy.

As has been pointed out in discussions held to date, the greatest issue facing Japanese companies is increasing productivity. By implementing all possible measures to towards this end and distributing the fruits of this effort to the workers, we will continuously improve the income level of the people and realize a virtuous economic cycle.

Specifically, firstly, a green growth strategy towards achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 is included in this plan. Going forward, we intend to support, as a national project, the development of new technologies by private sector companies that are working on revolutionary innovations. To this end, we will advance reviews over budgetary and taxation measures to support them. At the same time, we will draft a concrete plan that specifies the term goals in the green sector before the end of the year.

Secondly, the action plan outlines support for reform efforts being implemented by companies towards the ‘post-corona’ world. We will strengthen support for companies that advance business restructuring in a phased approach. In order to facilitate labor mobility to new areas while protecting employment, we intend to advance measures such as providing supports to trial employment and clarifying the rules on temporary transfers of employees to other firms. We also support companies advancing digital transformation of their business models with taxation measures.

Thirdly, the plan aims at strengthening supports to solidify the business foundations of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We will consider taxation measures to support SMEs’ efforts to increase their scale of businesses, such as mergers of SMEs. In addition, with regards to certain subsidy and financial support measures for SMEs, we intend for the Diet to consider an amendment to the relevant bills in the next ordinary session, to include those companies graduating from the SMEs category. We will also strengthen the partnership between major companies and SMEs.

The ministries and agencies will work as one to implement the items indicated in this action plan, starting from those that we can work on immediately. I ask the expert members to continue engaging in lively discussions and raising points.”