Geographical Review of Japan
Online ISSN : 2185-1719
Print ISSN : 0016-7444
ISSN-L : 0016-7444
Volume 37, Issue 8
Displaying 1-4 of 4 articles from this issue
  • Katsutaka ITAKURA, Sakuo IDE, Atsuhiko TAKEUCHI, Yoshiyuki KITAMURA
    1964 Volume 37 Issue 8 Pages 403-424
    Published: August 01, 1964
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Sixty-five percent of the industrial production of Japan comes from the three industrial areas of Keihin (Tôkyô-Yokohama), Hanshin (Ôsaka-Kôbe), and Chûkyô (Nagoya), of which the Keihin area is the greatest embracing Tôkyô, the capital and one of the greatest cities in the world, and Yokohama.
    Previously we have published the analyses on the distribution of the industries of Tôkyô, which is the central part of this industrial area. In this present article, however, we deal with the distribution of factories in a larger area focused on Tôkyô, and make its various characteristics clear.
    I) The geographical demarcation of this industrial area has not yet been clearly made. In most cases the area roughly includes Tôkyô Metropolis (Prefecture), and Kanagawa Prefecture with Yokohama and Kawasaki.
    We defined geographical extent of this industrial area through the results of calculating the added value for each city, town, and village in the study area, and also by taking as an index figure the proprotion of the assembly industries by added values.
    In the Keihin area thus defined, the factories wish more than four employees number 44, 282, which is 18 percent of the total number in Japan, and the number of employees counts 23 percent. The added value shows 28 percent of that for all Japan.
    II) As a result of completing the distribution map of the factories with more than 30 employees in the Keihin industrial area, and also through the study on the formation and development of this area, it has become clear that the area can be divided into two parts, that is, the “area of concentration” and the “surrounding area”.
    The concentration area is composed of the central, eastern, northern and southern parts of Tôkyô, Yokohama, Kawasaki, and the coastal areas (Tab. 2, Fig. 1). It is difficult to mark the extent of the coastal areas. Therefore, we use this term here with reference to the production of such commodities as those having direct contact with marine transportation. By this special method of desingnation, the extent of the areas are known to be narrow and their dependency on marine transportation little.
    III) All kinds of industries, if based on the moderate classification, exist in Keihin, but analysis by manufactured goods shows that large factories which produce basic materials, like steel, fertilizers, oil, chemicals, etc. are not many. Most of the factories depend on the demand from great cities or the central positions in the nationwide market, and are engaged either in the miscellaneous industries producing daily consumer goods, or in the assembly industries linked with the production of durable goods suchs as television sets, automobiles, cameras, and so forth.
    The fact that miscellaneous industries have commission factories, and assembly industries are operated with finished goods factories, as their respective central establishments, prevents most of the factories from maintaining contact among themselves; also the irregularity of delivery of parts and their uneven supply are regarded as other hindrances.
    Nevertheless, these two kinds of factories are linked by their similarity, in that all of them are producing several kinds of special goods in small quantities, and this has led them to congregate in the eastern and southern parts of Tôkyô respectively and today they form some of the Keihin industrial production system.
    IV) The development and expansion of the Keihin industrial area have been brought about chiefly by the outward movement of the factories of those nuclear areas, which has mostly taken place because of the changes in their relationships to the whole production system within the area, or due to the growth of enterprises and the ensuing need for larger sites.
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  • Yoshihiko SCHIRAI
    1964 Volume 37 Issue 8 Pages 425-449
    Published: August 01, 1964
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    It was one of the urgent demands in Japan before the Farm-land Reform to consolidate subdivided farm-land properties, because of their meticulous fragmentation and dispersion in consequence of old land-exploitation and intensive land use. Full-scale farm-land consolidation has, however, been promoted by the Land Improvement Law (1949) after World War II.
    The main problems of this paper are:
    (1) To what extent and range the fragmentation and the dispersion of farm-land have proceeded in Japan and why?
    (2) Why it was impossible to promote farm-land consolidation by the Arable Land Readjustment Law before the Farm-land Reform and to what range the farm-land consolidation has been developed regionally by the Land Improvement Law?
    (3) How the farm-land consolidations are carried out in relation to regional conditions?
    The results of this investigation are follow:
    (1) Fragmentation and disersion of farm-land are remarkable in Hokuriku and Tokai Districts in Central Japan, where compact village are prominently found in rice-field areas and planned land-allotment is said to have prevailed in the Edo Era. Relatively well consolidated ares are found surrounding Central Japan. As for the average size of the holding, that of the most newly developed Hokkaido is the largest, follow by Tohoku District. Some physical, farm-managing and social-economic factors for the fragmentation and dispersion of farm-land are pointed out.
    (2) As a countermeasure the Arable Land Readjustment Law was in execution befor the last war, which was promoted mainly for the purpose of landowners pursuit for a differential rent. According to the law, land properties were exchanged only among the land owners of a small scale and all others were left unchaged. (Fig. 1.2) Under the Land Improvement Law of 1949, farm-land consolidation has been carried on for the development of agricultural mechanization and rationalization of agricultural management by the initiative of peasantry and the help of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The work was done at 9, 123 localities with the total area of 1, 686, 551 ha, or 31.6% of the total farm-land area (1959 to 1960). (Fig. 3) The regional states of the progressing working work are as follows ; dry-field and rice-field one-crop areas along the coast of the Japan Sea are remarkable in farm-land consolidation and Tohoku District, where farm manegement is of large scale and farm mechanization is relatively slow in progress, and Tokai and Kinki Districts, where urbanization and industrialization have been remarkable advancing in recent years, are slow in promoting the consolidation.
    (3) Three types of farm-land consolidation are pointed out, according to regional conditions, as in the following:
    (a) Ddvelopment of land use—in Kawaji Area of Iida City, Nagano Prefecture, located in the Tenryu Valley of Central Japan. Topogeaphy of flood plain, terrace and upland were taken into consideration for the purpose of preventing flood damages in the valley and introducing fruit-growing and dairy farming into upland (Fig. 4. 5), applied them to mulberry field, rice field and fruit growing.
    (b) Adjustment of irrigation—in the Hikami Area of Kida County, Kagawa Prefecture, in the midist of the irrigation-pound area of Southwest Japan, they rectified the conventional irrigation systems proper to the actual conditions of irrigation pounds on the occasion of farm-land consolidation after the Farm-land Reform, reducing labour power and advancing land use highly (Fig. 6.7).
    (c) Removal of farm houses—in the Mihota Area of Asaka County, Fukushima Prefecture, in the middle of the rice field area of Northwest Japan, they developed rice fields by the irrigation water of the Asaka Irrigation Canal in the Meiji Era.
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  • In the case of Eastern District
    Gihachi TOMIOKA
    1964 Volume 37 Issue 8 Pages 450-468
    Published: August 01, 1964
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Inland traffic routes in the Chûgoku District have extensively been used since ancient times. The San'in and the San'yô traverse above all, were much greater in their importance because of their regional differences and their short distance between them. With the remarkable development of the Chûgoku District in recent years, it is naturally desired to have a historical recognition of the In-yô (Sani'n-San'yô) traverse routes which are, as they were, the source of local development.
    In the paper, I tried, setting the point of time at the end of the late Tokugawa era, to revive the inland traffic routes from both sides; one as a route for Daimyo to go up to Edo for an alternate-year residence or to send the payment of iron or copper to the authorities, the other as general economic routes mainly used for trading of salt. Furthermore, I investigated the geographical distribution of traffic means…by takasebune (barge), on horsebacks or cow's back, and so on, and studied their geographical characters.
    Next, taking up inland cities and towns from the point of view of political and economic centers, I recognized the following castle towns…IIkuno, Yamasaki, Tsuyama, Katsuyama, Niimi and Wakasa, and classified them by taffic from and by their mutual relations of the In-yô traverse routes. On the function and structure of these cities, I tried to grasp the connection between the In-yô main routes and the positions of these inland cities, and the pointed out some geographical characteristics. The following are the gist of the invetigation.
    (1) The limits of going upstream by takasebune nearly coincide with the 100-meter contour lines. But antecedent rivers such as the Asahi, the Takahashi, and the Gô run still farther inland. The gradient is about 1 in 400.
    (2) As to the relation between the traffic service by takasebune and the economics of inland cities, the limits of going upstream coincide with the locations of economic centers.
    (3) As to the relation between the positions of cities and inland traffic routes, the classification of inland cities is as follows; (A) cities with overland routes (Ikuno and Wakasa), and (B) cities with watercourses and overland routes (Tsuyama, Katsuyama, Niimi and Yamasaki). Now, if we set the starting point of an In-yô traverse route O, Ikuno and Wakasa fall in AO type; Katsuyama BO type and Niimi, Tsuyama and Yamasaki B type.
    (4) Ikuno on the San'In side (AO type) was politically built into a town with little traffic service owing to the specific condition of being a silver mining town under the direct control of Bakufu (Japan's feudal government).
    Accordingly, the small village of Ringai-mura came to develop into a traffic town, substituting for Ikuno. This town maintained the facilities of the concentration center of traffic and formed an economic center at the place where economic power of the silver mining town was crossed with the San'yo economic area.
    (5) Katsuyama on the San'yo side (BO type) formed itself into an eonomic center at the terminal point of a traverse route from San'in where the upper limit of takasebune from San'yô was found. Traffic with San'in is the main factor for the formation of this center.
    (6) Niimi (B type) was partially used as a post-town on In-yô traverse route, but its terminal point did not coincide with the location of any economic center. Niimi as a central place was formed by combining the urban economy to the economic area in the lower reaches of the Takahashi river with traffic service by takasebune. Rather it has characters of a pure inland city. In the case of Tsuyama, there is a more marked tendency of this sort.
    (7) In brief, geographical positions of these inland economic centers in San'yô or in San'in, manifest the orientation to urban economy.
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  • 1964 Volume 37 Issue 8 Pages 469-473_2
    Published: August 01, 1964
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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