Three venue changes have been approved for the Tokyo Olympic Games in 2020, organisers said on Friday, as part of International Olympic Committee-led efforts to streamline future tournaments and rein in budgets.
"It is a year since we established the organising committee and we are putting together our vision - we have a basic plan," Games CEO Toshiro Mutoh told reporters on the sidelines of the IOC's latest assessment of preparations for next year's Games, South America's first, in Rio.
Mutoh said changes had been agreed and were awaiting IOC approval for basketball, canoe slalom and equestrian events.
Rio is racing to deliver vastly improved infrastructure for 2016 amid concerns the hosts will not manage to fulfil a pledge to reduce by four fifths pollution in Guanabara Bay, which will host sailing events.
Further concerns are delivery of hugely upgraded transport links at a time when some of Brazil's largest construction companies are embroiled in a kickbacks scandal involving inflated contracts with state-owned oil firm Petrobras, raising questions as to those firms' abilities to deliver on Olympic commitments.
In Tokyo, where organisers earlier on Friday submitted their Games Foundation Plan to the IOC, general infrastructure is much further advanced as Japan's capital prepares to become the first Asian city to stage a second Summer Games having hosted in 1964.
Like Rio, Tokyo has not escaped controversy on budgets.
Tokyo has seen public protests in recent months over plans to demolish the National Stadium and replace it with a huge 80,000-seater stadium designed by British-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid.
Campaigners say the new design, standing some 70 metres high and initially set to cost in the region of $3 billion before a revised plan was submitted costing around 40 per cent less, is simply too big for its local environment.
Demolition of the existing stadium has twice been put back after bids for the job came in too low.
The Tokyo team initially pledged to have some 80 per cent of venues within eight kilometres radius of the Olympic Village, but with organisers looking to lop around $US1.7 billion ($A2.18 billion) of the Games overall budget some events are now set to move further afield to existing facilities.
Mutoh said the basketball was likely to move to Saitama's 37,000 arena Super Arena an hour away, the venue for the 2005 world basketball championship.
John Coates, head of the IOC inspection team for Tokyo, said using the Saitama arena would save $US700 million ($A900 million).
Equestrian moves to Baji Park, a venue from the city's 1964 Olympics. Canoe slalom goes from Kasai Rinkai Park to a spot outside the park.
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