TOKYO (AP) – Japan’s top telecommunications company is getting 7.3 billion yen – about $67 million – in taxpayer money to design mobile tracking software to curb the spread of coronavirus infections during the Tokyo Olympics. There’s one catch: Few Olympic fans from abroad will be around to use it.
On Saturday, Tokyo Olympic organizers and the IOC announced a ban on fans from abroad attending the games, which open on July 23. NTT Communications Corp., a group company of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. and a domestic sponsor of the Tokyo Games, heads the consortium developing the app in multiple languages set for release in June. Domestic sponsors have contributed a record $3.5 billion to the local organizing committee, about three times larger than any previous Olympics. Giant marketing company Dentsu Inc., the official marketing partner of the Tokyo Olympics, has driven contributions.
Like other skeptics, opposition lawmaker Kanako Otsuji has said the app wastes money.
“When there will likely be no spectators, is this the time to design an app for fans? The Japanese government has failed over and over in digital innovation, but it’s going to have success with this new app?” she said on her YouTube channel last month.
Users can download the app on their cell phones to monitor their whereabouts with satellite technology. In theory, it tracks infections. But it must be done in good faith and is effective only if people use it honestly and diligently to record their health conditions and warn others of outbreaks.last year.
Japan restricts people from entering the country because of the coronavirus pandemic, except for some essential travel and returning citizens.
NTT Communications declined to comment, referring queries to the government.
Tokyo-based NTT, founded in 1952, boasts close ties with the Japanese government. It’s now embroiled in a sprawling corruption scandal centered around lavishing entertainment on ministry bureaucrats that oversee telecommunications. Tokyo is officially spending $15.4 billion to prepare for the Olympics, but several government audits have suggested it’s at least $25 billion. All but $6.7 billion in public money.
While the pandemic has added to the costs, there will be few tourists to boost local coffers.
In 2019, before the pandemic hit, Japan raked in a record 4.8 trillion yen ($44 billion) from nearly 31.9 million overseas tourists, mainly from China and South Korea.
In contrast, international travelers to Japan last year, including foreign residents and families of Japanese, dwindled to 4.1 million people, according to the Japan National Tourism Organization. No money figure was available. Domestic tourism has also fallen to about half the previous year’s levels.
Japan has attributed about 9,000 deaths to COVID-19 but has barely started to roll out vaccines.
Marina Nakano, the spokeswoman for the Japan Cultural Expo, a government-backed program set up primarily to drum up tourism during the Tokyo Olympics, acknowledged cultural events pegged to the upcoming Games are still undecided.
Events set for last year were canceled, postponed, or moved online.
Nakano is hopeful that once things return to normal, tourism might come back, and her efforts to push Japanese culture will pay off in the long run.
The plans all had to be drastically changed,” she said.
AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/olympic-games and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
Yuri Kageyama is on Twitter https://twitter.com/yurikageyama
