A government panel has proposed that about 180 Japanese laws be translated into English by the end of fiscal 2009 to facilitate foreign direct investment.
The panel is tasked with promoting the translation of domestic legislation into other languages.
The government plans to endorse the council's recommendations at a meeting of ministry and agency officials Friday, and it will then seek public comments for a month, they said.
The council will make a final decision by March about which legislation will be translated after examining the public comments, according to officials.
The translation of laws is part of overall judicial reform efforts.
Ministries and businesses have already translated some laws on their own, but English versions have contained errors and there are no unified translation rules, the officials said.
The panel has already started translating 14 laws, including patent and copyright laws, which the business community needs.
It will also consider establishing a permanent body to change the English translations when laws are revised.
The panel plans to compile by the end of March a bilingual dictionary containing about 4,000 terms that are often used in Japanese laws.