Japan has named fiscal hawk Yano Reuters as chief bureaucrat of the Finance Ministry

By Tetsushi Kajimoto

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan has appointed Koji Yano as a fiscal hawk, best known for his close ties to Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, as the ministry’s chief minister and chief minister of finance.

Yano, currently the head of the budget office of the Ministry of Finance, is in charge of collecting the state budget, which was made as part of the annual staff restructuring, Finance Minister Taro Aso said on Wednesday.

Japan’s fiscal management is juggling pandemic-breaking spending with efforts to reduce the world’s toughest public debt.

Yano, who will replace Mitsuru Ota, has been Suga’s secretary for three years since 2012 when Suga was the government’s chief spokesman.

Suga politicians have come under increasing pressure to boost pandemic spending this year ahead of this year’s general election. Attention will be paid to how Yano protects calls for large-scale fiscal stimulus while rationalizing budget expenditures.

It is likely that Yano will lay the groundwork for meeting the elusive target of achieving a primary budget surplus by 2025, excluding new bond sales and debt service costs.

Last year, he worked to reduce the size of funds planned in the Suga administration – aimed at decarbonisation and the so-called university fund – which was concerned about the deterioration of public finances, those with prior knowledge of the subject told Reuters.

Yano is a graduate of Hitotsubashi University, one of the top universities in Japan, compared to most elite bureaucrats in the ministry who usually graduate from the more prestigious University of Tokyo.

Among other appointments, the ministry appointed Masato Kanda as head of the international currency as the main official currency, which will lead Japan to the Group of Seven and the broadest Group of 20 meetings.

Kanda is familiar with a number of political issues and is familiar with a number of domestic and foreign politicians, including Haruhiko Kuroda, governor of the Bank of Japan, who was the main official currency until the beginning of 2003 for three and a half years.