Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Wednesday appointed 180 central government officials as regional revitalization support officers to be deeply involved in assisting specific municipalities in rural areas.

In a key project of Ishiba's signature Regional Revitalization 2.0 initiative, the officers will work in groups of three to help 60 municipalities, including Biei in Hokkaido, Wajima in Ishikawa Prefecture and Okaya in Nagano Prefecture.

They will regularly hold online meetings with officials at the municipalities they support and make visits to provide advice and other assistance to solve problems faced by the areas. Also, they will introduce available support systems and share successful examples

At a ceremony at his official residence, Ishiba instructed those appointed for the work to provide "thorough, careful and kind support."

"It's important for the central and local governments to have a sense of unity," he stated. "I want you to like the municipalities you will help. I want you to think with local people how you can develop good examples into something universal."

The support officers will assist local governments for one year while concurrently carrying out their work duties at the central government.

Ishiba said that the project will continue into next year and beyond.

Kentaro Komaki, an official at the internal affairs ministry's Residents Administration Policy and Management Division, was among the three appointed as support officers for Ogori, Fukuoka Prefecture.

"It's important to increase not only the number of residents but also the number of people involved in local communities," Komaki told reporters. "I want to contribute through trial and error, taking care not to let regional revitalization efforts turn into competition for people."