Independent Administrative Institution National Museum - Overview

Overview

The combined National Museum was intended to enhance plans to enrich the national collections and improve museum facilities as well as the ability to collect, preserve, display, and study cultural properties, including works of art and archaeological objects.

As a long-term goal, Japan's National Museum aims to enhance its functions as an educational facility and as a platform for international cultural exchanges and the dissemination of Japanese culture. Short term planning focused on improving the efficiencies of operation, enhancing the range of services provided to the public, and consolidating the museums' financial position.

In order to achieve these objectives, the National Museum has identified a number of basic roles it needs to fulfill in order to make itself more appealing to the public and attract more people to the museum:

• To serve as a conduit for "inheriting" Japanese culture—passing down Japanese cultural properties and Japan's invaluable national properties to the following generations in good condition
• To present cultural properties to the public in order to improve and develop Japanese culture
• To promote cultural exchanges between Japan and foreign countries, thus serving as a representative

of Japanese culture

• To contribute to the activities of museums in Japan and abroad, as Japan's central museum