Tokyo: Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida vowed on Thursday to bring the Japanese economy onto a sustainable growth path, as the government the same day upgraded its growth forecast for fiscal 2023.

“While overcoming rising prices at present, we’ll put our economy onto a sustainable growth path led by private demand,” Kishida told a meeting of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, chaired by the prime minister.

Kishida also pledged to swiftly implement the government’s recently enacted second supplementary budget for fiscal 2022 to finance a comprehensive economic package to fight inflation.

The meeting was held to discuss the government’s latest projection that the country’s gross domestic product in fiscal 2023, starting next April, will grow 1.5 pct from the previous year in price-adjusted real terms, faster than its July forecast of 1.1 pct.

At the meeting, a council member from the private sector said that it is necessary to discuss medium- to long-term macroeconomic management, as well as challenges that need to be solved to realize a virtuous cycle of growth and distribution, as the economic and social environments are changing drastically due in part to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Kishida indicted that he plans to have the council, together with related experts, discuss the matter early next year at the earliest.

JIJI Press