Japan aims to set FY 2010 Budget Plan in early October

Japan’s new government is aiming to set the direction for the Fiscal 2010 budget in ‘very early October’ but realizes that the goal of introducing green taxes is likely to be difficult in the immediate future, Finance Minister Hirohisa Fujii said. Despite the limited time, the government will draft the budget from scratch and will abandon the basic framework created by the previous government, Fujii said.The basic framework has an all-time-high 52.67 trillion yen (US$577.08 billion) ceiling on general expenditures. As to a new tax system aimed at reining in global warming, the Democratic Party of Japan’s campaign platform said that the party would “study the introduction,” without specifying a time frame. Fujii suggested that the introduction would come after the planned repeal of provisional portions of gasoline and other fuel taxes in Fiscal Year 2010. (September 18, 2009)