## 4 Facilitating traffic access to airports

With respect to improving traffic access to metropolitan airports, the Council of Transport Policy, which reviews approaches to future urban railways in the Tokyo Area, is examining such improvements. Studies towards the construction of the direct line to city center are also ongoing.

## Section 2

## I mplementing Comprehensive and Integrated Logistics Policies

In accordance with the Comprehensive Logistic Policy Guidelines (2013-2017), logistics policies are implemented in a comprehensive and integrated manner in coordination between the public and private sectors.

## I mplementing logistic policies to correspond with deepening global supply chains

To keep up with deepening global supply chains, efforts directed at reinforcing Japan’s international logistic facilities are under way, including driving overseas deployment of the nation’s logistic systems.

## (1) Promoting overseas deployment of Japan’s logistics systems

As supply chains continue to get globalized at a deeper level than ever, grabbing the evolving Asian markets would be essential to sustaining and enhancing the international competitiveness of Japan’s industries. The formation of a sophisticated international logistics system should be of prerequisite importance to meet this urge. Capturing the Asian markets has become an urgent task for Japanese logistics companies that support the business expansion of the nation’s industries in Asia.

However, the existence of institutional and customary constraints in the partner countries is posing challenges to Japan in expanding its high-quality logistics systems into Asian nations. Therefore, the MLIT is developing an environment to encourage overseas expansion of Japan’s logistics systems through logistics pilot projects, dialogs between governments, development of human resource projects, and other means in collaboration between the public and private sectors.

## (2) Strengthening the functioning of the international marine transportation network

As the globalization of economy progresses, the volume of international marine transportation continues to grow year to year. From the perspective of optimizing marine transportation through large bundle shipments, container carriers and bulkers continue to grow in size. In the meantime, key Asian ports have successfully increased their volumes of freight handling, resulting in concentrated ports of call, international trunk routes making fewer calls at Japan. Furthermore, slow responses to larger vessels to carry bulk cargo raise concerns over diminishing competitiveness in domestic industries forced into a mutually disadvantageous business environment.

In light of such conditions, Japan carries on its effort to streamline the flow of logistics that supports economic activity in Japan and life of citizens, improving the shipping entities at their location at home, which would in turn augment Japan's industrial competitiveness and realize economic reconstruction by maintaining and expanding the calls of international trunk routes at Japanese ports and simplifying and stabilizing imports of lifeblood materials, such as resources and energies.

In parallel with these approaches, efforts to shape an efficient network of marine transportation in which international and domestic transport services are integrated will be carried on, and relevant measures will be enhanced and developed at a deeper level of refinement.

## (i) Enhancing the facilities of strategic international container ports

To strengthen Japanese economy’s international competitiveness and to maintain and create citizens’ employment, the international trunk routes of marine container transportation that link Japan to North America, Europe, and other places need to be consistently maintained and even expanded.