In Japan, forestry is undertaken either by forest owning families or by forestry organizations, such as forest owners’ cooperatives or private enterprises. In the National Population Census, workers are classified either as “employees” including directors or non-“employees” in “employment status” classification. We expect workers in forestry organizations are employed, while workers in forest owning families are not officially employed. So we analyzed the forestry worker data utilizing the “employment status” classification from 1980 to 2010 to grasp the characteristics of workers in forest owning families and those in forestry organizations. More than 95% of non-“employees” of “forestry” workers, in industry classification, are comprised of “agricultural, forestry and fisheries laborers”, in occupational classification. 60 to 65% of “employees” of “forestry” workers are comprised of “forestry laborers”, and a little lager than 20% are of “clerical and related workers”. The ratios of “forestry laborers” to“ forestry” workers were increasing in both these categories. The definition of “cooperative associations not elsewhere classified” was changed in 2007, which affected the counting of “forestry” workers to increase. This is apparent for “employees”, but not for non-“employees”, since there have been none of “forestry laborers” in “cooperative associations not elsewhere classified” for non-“employees” category consistently since 1980. We re-estimate the total number of forestry work force, taking account of “employment status”, to be about 74,000 in 2010.
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