But Muto repeated that the chances of the central bank ending the current policy will grow toward next fiscal year starting April if economic and price conditions continue to improve as expected. The deputy governor added that the central bank will need to debate ways to boost transparency in monetary policy, as the end of quantitative easing will require a new way to stabilize the market's policy expectations. Muto said he had no "predetermined notion" of how that should be accomplished at the moment, but sounded cautious over the idea of setting specific numerical inflation targets to guide monetary policy, as called for by some in the government. Muto acknowledged that some central banks outside of Japan have adopted the policy, but added "conditions vary according to each central bank, and each country." For Japan, it would be hard to "clearly set" a desirable rate of inflation, and "there are a lot of factors which will need to be debated with regard to inflation targeting," Muto said. Muto also countered calls from some members of the ruling coalition and government, including Internal Affairs Minister Heizo Takenaka, that the central bank aim to ensure that nominal growth outpaces interest rates on government bonds, as a means of helping the government reduce its massive fiscal deficit. "I believe that long-term interest rates reflect the market's outlook for future economic and price conditions, in addition to the added risk of holding the bonds - a so-called 'risk premium'," Muto said. While there have been times when long-term interest rates have fallen below nominal growth, "over the long-run, long-term interest rates have a tendency to be higher than nominal growth rates," he said.