Japan: visit of Secretary of State for culture, media and sport
Published 1 December 2014
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This publication was archived on 4 July 2016
This article is no longer current. Please refer to Overseas Business Risk – Japan
Summary
As Japan prepares for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, we set out our stall on tourism, sport, culture and digital.
Detail
There’s a burgeoning tourism and sports partnership between the UK and Japan, in the run-up to the Rugby World Cup (England 2015, Japan 2019) and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics. These big events offer the UK commercial opportunities, and pose Japan major digital challenges.
The Secretary of State met key Japanese tourism leaders; he combined forces with Sally Balcombe, CEO of Visit Britain, in broadcasting to the Japanese audience the UK tourism story: 2013 the best year on record for inbound tourism to Britain; over 32.8 million inbound visitors, a 13% increase on 2012, who contributed more than £21 billion to the economy. However, we need more partnerships to raise the numbers of Japanese tourists above their current 250,000. At a roundtable lunch with a ‘Tourism, Country Branding and Olympics’ theme the Secretary of State set out London’s Olympic legacy to the Tokyo Olympics organizers and British business. During a visit to the Miraikan (Future Science) Museum, the Secretary of State saw demonstrations of robots, including Honda’s ASIMO. There is scope for cooperation with London’s Science Museum around a possible Robot Olympics to coincide with Tokyo 2020.
The Minister for Education said that, thanks to the lesson of London’s Cultural Olympiad, he would be running, post Rio, a component of the Olympics and Paralympics to promote the country’s culture, and stimulating tourism in the longer term across the country as a whole.
We also looked at the digital future, partly in the context of what will be the most digital Olympics in history. One leading company in this sector hosted a breakfast which focused on the future of broadband in the UK and Japan. The Minister was also able to continue discussions around the expansion of UK broadband with two big investors into the UK from the gaming sector. Both were positive about the UK as an operating environment. Both companies are considering further expansions in the UK. And in a discussion with Japanese and UK ICT and media firms, it became clear that Japanese companies are becoming increasingly open to alliances with overseas firms in the sector to accelerate product development, given the growing competition from East Asian rivals.
We will keep up the momentum on Olympics cooperation, with a trade mission comprising sixteen UK companies visiting Tokyo to present their capabilities linked to Global Sport and Major Event transport, design and advisory services.
Disclaimer
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