TOKYO, Jan. 11, 20244—A groundbreaking ceremony was held for Singapore’s pavilion Jan. 10, 2024 as the first country to begin construction for the 2025 Osaka Expo as other countries struggle to find builders for their exhibits in time for the April 13, 2025 opening, the search being made even more arduous by the Jan. 1, 2024 Noto Peninsular earthquake. The exhibit organizers, comprising government officials and big business executives, are registering resolve to ram through the event with polite disregard for the horrific disaster.
As of Jan. 9, 2024, a total of 35 countries had exchanged with the Japanese Osaka Expo secretariat to take part in the event, according to secretariat officials. As many as 20 oor so countries are continuing search for contractors to build their pavilions, they said. The expo website (https://www.expo2025.or.jp/en/) cited 14 countries as being committed to build their pavilions, including Italy, China, the United States, India, and France.
The Osaka Expo construction work comes right smack with construction of the Osaka Integrated Resort project (https://www.pref.osaka.lg.jp/attach/30857/00000000/english.pdf) in an adjacent northern location that also commenced recently and is expected to gain full speed this summer, when construction equipment, trucks and workers move around busily. At peak times, some estimates say that more than 3,000 trucks would criss-cross the site, which is a small man-made island.
MGM Resorts and about 20 local businesses would invest 100 billion yen in Osaka IR, which would become Japan’s first legally-recognized casinos housed in new hotels.
The Osaka Expo management cost last year was estimated to exceed 1 trillion yen ($6.9 billion), ore more than 50 percent higher than initially planned. The cost probably would rise further when the event ends in October 2025 as clean-up and other costs are likely to go up.
But the Osaka Expo secretary general, Hiroyuki Ishige, expressed resolve to hold the event even as more than 30,000 Noto Peninsular residents stay in temporary shelters after the January 1 quake. He told a New Year gathering of secretariat employees that preparations are progressing firmly with 35 countries having signed up to build pavilions and more than 60 others had expressed intentions to join (https://www.expo2025.or.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/0110_n01_20240104_Secretary-General-Ishige-2024-Message.pdf). Meticulous planning, he said, would ‘lead to success’ to show to visitors the future and world. Ishige suggested that the expo doesn’t have a clearly-defined theme but that is something that people who gather at the venues can create – so no matter what happens toward April 2025, he will charge on.
Ishige’s stubborn and confident attitude is not his own making alone. He’s surrounded by a cadre of senior national government bureaucrats, particularly those from the Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry, where he retired as a top bureaucrat and then joined METI’s unit, the Japan External Trade Organization. He’s also backed by the Osaka Prefecture and Osaka City bureaucracies, as well as top business leaders.
By the time when the expo venues are clear of pavilions and other structures, taxpayers would hear news that the final Osaka Expo running cost topped more than double the initial cost. By then, however, expo secretariat should be resolved and taxpayers would find nobody they can blame.
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