The situation of domestic waste disposal in Japan has changed dramatically in recent years. District disposal principles such as intraregional waste disposal have collapsed, and territorial expansion of waste disposal has developed throughout the country initiated by administrative divisions. This study clarifies the current state of the domestic waste management and waste movement in the Japanese metropolitan area and its suburbs. In order to accomplish this, Tokyo Metropolis and its adjacent prefecture, Saitama Prefecture, were examined as a case study. In addition, the recent reorganization of the waste management sphere was analyzed and discussed.
Within 23 Tokyo wards, central wards, such as Shinjuku ward have depended for many years on peripheral wards for medium waste treatment. Currently all wards manage waste jointly, but each ward intends to manage waste self-sufficiently in future. In the Tama region and the eastern part of the Saitama Prefecture (metropolitan suburbs), cooperative processing with the vicinity municipalities and the management by a single municipality are combined in the middle treatment. The western part of the Saitama Prefecture, which is located in the outside edge of the metropolitan area, has been doing the middle process of waste treatment jointly with multiple municipalities.
The final disposal of waste is done extensively in all regions. The movement of waste for final disposal remains within the Tokyo 23 wards, the Tama region, and the western part of the Saitama Prefecture. On the other hand, in the eastern part of the Saitama Prefecture, the wastes are transported out of the prefecture (e. g., to the Tohoku region).
Reorganization of the waste management sphere has not occurred in the Tokyo Metropolis and urban area of Saitama prefecture. In the eastern part of the Saitama prefecture, however, the disposal management is being reorganized based on existing regional disposal areas. In the western part of the Saitama Prefecture, there has been a shift for wider areal reorganization from the current joint administration.
Finally, current conditions of disposal management and reorganization were modeled, and regional trends and their factors were considered. This study concluded that the socio-economic characteristics of municipalities (e. g., budget, population, degree of urbanization) and their location (e. g., edges of metropolitan area, metropolitan suburbs, and the outside of metropolitan area) have strongly influenced the reorganization of domestic waste disposal, the waste movement, and the waste management sphere.

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Technology tradition, raw materials and securing a market are put up as a functions to be necessary for a continuation of the place of production of local industry. I examined a form of technology tradition, an acquisition form of raw wood and a form of circulation sale in recent years with the place of production for Kokeshi of Naruko/Togatta/Yajiro of Miyagi as an example by this study and clarified the characteristics.
For a technology tradition, only a form of technology of “Family” continues to exist in some enterprises. However, parents tend to give advice to their children for other occupations, because financial difficulties continue in a lot of enterprises.
For an acquisition of raw materials, there is no problem about especially limits of a quantity of a raw wood, because today they acquire a raw wood which has been used traditionally. However, there is a situation that they must limit a quantity of acquisition of a raw wood, because there is a shortage of a purchase fund for a raw wood because of financial difficulties in some enterprises.
As for the product, each enterprise produces a traditional Kokeshi doll, a creation Kokeshi doll and a wooden toy. In particular, enterprises mainly produce a traditional Kokeshi, because its demand is much. For a form of circulation sale, there are some wholesale stores in the place of production for Kokeshi, but a business opportunity between enterprises and wholesale stores has been decreasing because of a demand decrease of a client of a wholesale store. In addition, a course to wholesale to retail stores reduces. Therefore, it is needed to develop a market in each enterprise, but there are a few enterprises which secure a stable market with their original management strategy.

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