The purpose of this paper is to clarify the development process of the Japanese agricultural machine industry during the interwar period. The historical significance of the agricultural machine industry has been mainly studied in the fields of agricultural and industrial technology. This paper is the first attempt to evaluate it form the viewpoint of the industrial and business history.
Unlike the American agricultural machine, which had developed from reapers or the tractors, the growth of the Japanese agricultural machines before World War II was led by the development of threshers and hulling machines. We can confirm the progress of agricultural mechanization by small machines. One characteristic of Japanese agriculture is the large number of petty farmers whose diversified small tenable lots made agricultural mechanization by large-sized machines impossible. Big firms like International Harvester in the United States manufactured both engines and machines, but in Japan, each factory specialized in the production of engines or machines (threshers and hulling machines). In this paper, therefore, the petrol engines and agricultural machines are examined separately.
The increase in the production of petrol engines was led by both big factories such as Kubota Ironwork, and small- and medium-sized factories (e.g., the network of small factories in Okayama city). In the case of agricultural machines, they established their own production embedded in agricultural implements in the 1920s. Lastly, the distribution system, evolved from dependence on indigenous implements and hardware distribution in the 1920s to a new system supported by dealers specializing in engines and agricultural machines in the 1930s.
