Around two years ago, the Japanese government announced its ambitious goals of significantly increasing foreign sales of domestic pop culture – and now went into detail for the first time in a presentation. We summarize below.
Massive anime offensive
In the document, the Japanese government confirms its plan to expand the turnover of the creative industries abroad to 20 trillion yen (the equivalent of around 107 billion euros) by 2033. In this context, the individual segments such as anime, video games and manga were also broken down.
A target value of six trillion yen was given for the anime sector, which corresponds to approximately three times the current market volume. For comparison: the international anime market was 1.46 trillion yen in 2022, rose to 1.72 trillion yen in 2023 and already reached 2.17 trillion yen in 2024.
To achieve this, the basic strategy is to support the expansion of distribution platforms, the building of development platforms and the production of large-scale releases.
In addition, the number of “blockbuster” works is to be increased and the performance-related remuneration of employees is to be increased.
More segments
Likewise, the Japanese government aims to increase the gaming industry’s overseas market from the current 3.4 trillion yen to up to 12 trillion yen by 2033 by supporting development and providing tax incentives for research and development.
Finally, the global manga market is to be increased from 300 billion yen to one trillion yen (around 5.3 million euros) by 2033, which is to be achieved through the expansion of distribution platforms, increased localization efforts and more efficient measures to combat manga piracy.
Together, anime, manga and games are expected to have a total value of 19 trillion yen, covering around 95% of the target value of 20 trillion yen. The remaining 5% will then come from music and live-action films.
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Via METI
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