Breakdown of governmental budget for art and culture Japan FY 2020, by purpose

The Agency for Cultural Affairs in Japan planned to contribute around 39.5 billion Japanese yen for the inheritance and utilization of cultural assets through proper maintenance, according to the fiscal year 2020 budget for art and culture. This category accounted for the highest share of about 37 percent of the total art and culture budget for that fiscal year. Proper preservation of cultural assets includes restoration and repair of traditional architecture, historical remains, and works of art.

Cultural assets

As it can be observed in the distribution of the annual budget plan, the Japanese government considers the protection, inheritance, and utilization of cultural assets as one of the most important projects among the art and culture related measures. Besides the UNESCO World Heritage Sites and Intangible cultural heritage, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) in Japan designates historically and academically valuable cultural assets as Important Cultural Properties. Furthermore, the Ministry selects five other categories of cultural resources: intangible cultural properties, intangible and tangible folk-cultural properties, monuments, and cultural landscapes. The owners of designated assets have an obligation under the Act on Protection of Cultural Properties to adequately preserve the assets. They can issue a request for a subsidy from the government if it is not feasible to deliver proper maintenance.

Important Cultural Properties

Important Cultural Properties can be classified into arts and crafts, and buildings. As of 2020, there were over 13 thousand Important Cultural Properties defined by MEXT, of which the large majority were of arts and crafts categories such as paintings, sculptures, calligraphy, and historical documents. The Tokyo National Museum owns a wide arts and crafts collection of Important Cultural Properties and exhibits them both in permanent displays and temporary events. To facilitate inbound tourism, the Agency for Cultural Affairs offers a special website and YouTube channel with VR content to introduce buildings of Important Cultural Properties and surrounding areas to national and international audiences.