Japan gov’t launches in-house-developed AI to assist civil servants

The Japanese government has initiated a large-scale trial project for an in-house-developed generative AI platform, named "Genai," to aid civil servants in their work. This project targets approximately 180,000 government employees, comprising those at field offices. Genai draws its name from Hiraga Gennai, an 18th-century Japanese inventor, and references "generative AI." Beyond streamlining writing and translation tasks, Genai aims to expedite the drafting of responses to parliamentary queries in the near future.

The government intends to assess the system's efficiency and pinpoint challenges during the trial, with plans to fully deploy Genai by fiscal 2027. Developed by the Digital Agency, Genai's trial commenced at the agency in May of the previous year, with its development underpinning a degree of confidentiality. This pilot project expanded to encompass other ministries and agencies in May of this year.

A recent survey conducted by the Cabinet Bureau of Personnel Affairs highlighted that, during Diet sessions, government departments typically spent an average of seven hours and 16 minutes to draft parliamentary question responses. This time was attributed to activities such as reviewing legal interpretations, past responses, and conducting policy analyses. Similar surveys over the past few years have consistently indicated a drafting time of six to seven hours.

Genai features a search function that compiles past parliamentary transcripts, laws, and other resources. The agency is also developing a function to draft responses to lawmakers' questions by analyzing and organizing key points, with a trial service set to launch by year-end. While human staff will continue to verify the factual accuracy of the drafts and assume final decision-making responsibilities, including policy judgments, Genai is anticipated to markedly enhance efficiency.

Additionally, Genai possesses the capability to classify extensive volumes of public comments and opinions, which can range from several thousand to tens of thousands, depending on the subject matter. Processing such comments can be time-consuming. The platform can also transcribe audio recordings from meetings and facilitate translation.