Interesting that they are removing it due to not seeing returns. Maybe it’s just poorly phrased, but I figured the goal wasn’t to make money, but to promote soft power. As far as that goes, it seems to be pretty successful, just look at all the high grossing anime movies. I wonder if other countries will try to take their place. I know some animation coming out of China has been crazy high quality, and Korea has been amassing for years with stuff like K-pop. Just seems like a strange time to start pulling back from having a larger presence on the global media stage.
My completely wild guess is that it is not benefiting the people from the right faction inside the party (LDP) anymore because the cabinet changed since the fund was set up. Perhaps something else will be set up for the new in-power faction to siphon on.
