The cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at an extraordinary meeting Friday, adopted basic economic and fiscal policy guidelines calling for intensified efforts to digitize administrative work over the next year.
The coronavirus crisis has highlighted the Japanese government's inferior online capabilities. With its poor information technology infrastructure, the government failed to swiftly implement relief programs to coronavirus-hit businesses and people,including 100,000-yen cash handouts to all households.
The guidelines thus give top priority to achieving an e-government.
To make administrative work much more efficient through digitization, the government will set up a "control tower" at the Cabinet Secretariat in line with the guidelines and let staff members including private-sector experts help each agency achieve a preset target rate for online system utilization. Paper work, authorization using "hanko" name seals and face-to-face talks will basically be abolished.
The government will also push for the digitization of society, particularly in education and medical services, so people can live ordinary lives with the novel coronavirus. To further promote teleworking, numerical targets will be set.
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Quelle/Source: nippon.com, 17.07.2020
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