Thirty-five Years of Environmental Policy in Japan: Past and Present

Abstract

This paper examines thirty-five years of Japanese environmental policy by referring to the results of the past three OECD environmental policy reviews as well as a policy stage analysis. OECD reviews revealed the following four characteristics of Japanese environmental policy: non-economic approaches, regulatory measures against only a few specific pollutants, heavy reliance on administrative guidance, and the important role played by local authorities.

In addition, this paper evaluates the current policy designed to attain the target set by the Kyoto Protocol and considers future options for creating a society to address climate change through a comparison with EU and US policies.

In the 1980s, Japan successfully decoupled economic growth and the emission of pollutants by combining various policy measures such as emission standards and preferential treatment of pollution investment. This decoupling was most successful in the case of SO_x emissions. However, the decoupling trend ceased in 1990s, and CO₂ emissions continue to rise despite various technological and voluntary measures. Based on this analysis, the paper advocates substantial structural change by introducing ecological tax reforms, domestic emissions trading, and other incentive measures.