The government is considering introducing a reduced tax rate for some products to ease the burden when it raises the consumption tax rate by 2 percentage points to 10 percent in April 2017, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Tuesday.

"It is extremely natural that (the government) will introduce reduced tax rates simultaneously" with the tax hike, Suga said, referring to rates aimed at helping lower income earners and smaller companies in a tax reform plan adopted by the ruling coalition last year.

The government's chief spokesman told a news conference that a pledge made by the Liberal Democratic Party in the House of Representatives election last December and a subsequent coalition accord with the Komeito party made a similar "promise" to the public.