Wakayama & Nagasaki: Integrated Resort Progress

Recent efforts to construct several integrated resorts across Japan have already been subjected to a substantial degree of frustration and controversy. In Yokohama, the election of a Mayor characterized by his aggressive anti-gambling stance led to the prefecture’s IR ambitions being put firmly on ice.

Wakayama and Nagasaki’s respective endeavours to establish integrated resorts have been more productive, however each have faced notable resilience in recent months.

In Wakayama, anti-IR campaigners’ parties have gathered 20,000 opposing signatures in an attempt to force through a local referendum on the issue; the threshold to trigger such a vote requires just 6,200. It therefore looks likely that the resort’s fate rests in the hands of the electorate.

However, its still likely that the decision to go to the ballot box would need to be ratified by local council members, which could take us to January. Therefore, it looks as if Wakayama IR officials will have a nervous wait prior to the April formal submission deadline.

Nagasaki’s resistance is slightly less emphatic, but nevertheless continues to cause a headache for integrated resort advocates and associated partner groups.

Stakeholders in the prefecture are readily communicating out updates and economic advantages that will transpire as a result of the project, speculating that the area would receive a colossal ¥320B (US$2.82B) boost through linked revenue streams.

The local IR proposal panel, along with partners Casinos Austria, have also recently announced ambitious expansion plans, although funding sources remain unclear. The group has suggested that full transparency on costs will be delivered at the Nagasaki Prefectural Assembly in March- just a month shy of the submission deadline.

Pro-IR groups still remain optimistic in both Wakayama and Nagasaki, but time will tell whether any will succumb to the same fate as Yokohama.