Interest
Pokémon Seal Osaka's Bid for World Expo 2025
posted on by Lynzee Loveridge
Pikachu and Eevee have been busy promoting the Pokémon: Let's Go Nintendo Switch games this year, but in the background Pokémon have also led a campaign to win over the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE) and cement Osaka's bid to host the World Expo in 2025. The Foreign Minister of Japan Taro Kono appointed Pikachu as an ambassador last year, a decision that paid off on Friday.
BIE announced that its Member States elected Japan over competitors Russia and Azerbaijan to host the World Expo in 2025. The country will be quite busy as Tokyo was already elected as the host of 2020 Olympics as well.
The official Twitter account for Japan's World Expo bid shared organizers' excitement on Friday and answered questions about the project. The account explained why organizers are working together with Pokémon and stated:
"Pokémon's world view is one of diversity with more than 800 types of Pokémon living together, and it is this view of the future of society that Japan is aiming to represent through the Expo. We think a world view that we can share across language and cultural barriers will become increasingly important in the future."
Japan shared its point of view in a concept video for both the World Expo site and its hope of using technology to bring people together.
Before the results were announced, Japan created a special Pokémon Expo website. The site hosted a quiz to find readers' "Expo Type" and help spread the campaign via social media. Voice actress and singer Shōko Nakagawa, model Nicole Fujita, and Japanese comedy trio Panther participated in the campaign.
Nakagawa congratulated Osaka on its win via Twitter on Friday.
The World Expo is held every five years and can last in for up to six months in their host city. The themes of World Expos are designed to raise awareness of and find responses to universal challenges of our time. Milan, Italy held the most recent Expo in 2015 with the theme "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life.” The 2020 World Expo will be held in Dubai, UAE.
