Bank of Japan policymakers have agreed on the need to focus on keeping interest rates stably low while the economy remains under the strain caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, minutes of the central bank's March meeting showed on Thursday.

With state-of-emergency curbs to contain the pandemic hurting consumption and keeping deflation risks alive, the nine board members agreed there was "extremely high uncertainty" over the outlook, according to the minutes.

One member said the risk of deflation was still bigger than that of inflation for Japan, as wages and inflation expectations remain on a weak note.