Japan Govt Spends Over 800 Billion Yen for Tokyo Games

October 5, 2018

Tokyo- The Japanese government had spent about 801.1 billion yen on 286 state projects related to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics by fiscal 2017, which ended in March, the Board of Audit of Japan said Thursday.

The number of projects that had been launched since Tokyo was selected to host the 2020 Games in 2013 and the amount of spending on them were revealed for the first time.

The board noted that there were problems. For instance, 13 projects of the sports ministry to develop sports gear to boost Japanese athletes' medal-winning capabilities were halted halfway after 162 million yen was spent in total.

Meanwhile, a project to prevent doping, also under the sports ministry's initiative, had only secured 269 examiners, falling short of the required target of some 500.

The board advised that the government, which adopted 70 project categories at a cabinet meeting in 2015, sort out its classification and criteria on the relevance to the Tokyo Games and consider entirely disclosing projects deemed especially helpful for the 2020 Games. Jiji Press