Japan’s finance chief calls for early budget passage following quake

Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki on Tuesday called for the swift passage of a fiscal 2024 budget to help Japan deal with recent inflation through more robust pay hikes and extend “full” support to areas hit by the deadly earthquake on New Year’s Day.

The ¥112.57 trillion ($763 billion) budget for the fiscal year beginning in April, revised after the magnitude 7.6 quake devastated the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture, is necessary to tackle a spate of issues that should not be postponed any longer because Japan is “at a historic turning point” in achieving sustainable growth, Suzuki told parliament.

The government has doubled the amount of emergency funds in the budget to ¥1 trillion to spend on relief and reconstruction work in a “seamless and flexible manner,” he said.