Abstract
National government policies on preventing global warming are becoming increasingly important in Japan, especially since the Kyoto Protocol became effective in 2005, and the first commitment period began in 2008. The Forestry Agency has combined policies promoting domestic forestry with those to prevent global warming and has developed a 10-year action plan. However, the forest resource database and related statistics represent serious problems in the forest management system in Japan and in the administrative work of the prefectural governments that manage the database. The database contains much incorrect data, which is difficult to correct because of insufficient budget and staff. The budget problem has seriously affected the entire administrative section of the Forestry Agency since the 1990s. Environmental taxes related to forests have recently been introduced in many prefectures, although the total revenue generated is small. The basic problem with the database is that the National Land Survey is incomplete and, consequently, the forest land size information in the database is unreliable. Furthermore, because prefectural governments are not required to report statistics on timber harvests, the cutting volume in each municipality is uncertain. Considering this situation, it may be difficult for the private forest sector to contribute greatly to the Kyoto Protocol without changes in the forest management system by both national and prefectural governments.
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Notes
Japan has both ‘protection’ and ‘protected’ forests, and the similarity of the names can be confusing. The Forest Law designates protection forests for public purposes, such as headwater conservation and disaster prevention. Both national and private forests can be classified as protection forests. On the other hand, a protected forest is a category only within the national forest system and is mainly designated for ecosystem preservation qualities. In principle, a protected forest is to be preserved without any human intervention.
A law to promote the use of biomass energy from agriculture, forestry and fisheries came into effect on 1 October 2008
The Basic Forestry Law was introduced in 1964 for the purpose of increasing timber production, timber productivity and income of forest workers. This law was fully revised in 2001, and the title of the law was changed to the Basic Forest and Forestry Law.
Forest land areas with subsidized trees are always correctly surveyed because surveying is a requirement to obtain subsidies.
A harvest report must be submitted to the municipal office when a forest owner plans to cut trees, including trees that are not for sale. Article 10(8) of the Forest Law stipulates that the report must include location, area, age of trees to be cut, and cutting method, as well as plans for forest land management after cutting.
The total expenditure for the private forestry sector has been decreasing since the second half of the 1990s (Ishizaki 2010). This trend can be found at the national, prefectural and municipal levels.
The 2008 revision of the Kyoto Protocol Target Achievement Plan strongly promotes thinning to increase well-managed forest areas, and the revised plan aims for 200,000 ha of additional thinning per year from fiscal year 2007–2012. The Special Measures Law for the Purpose of Promoting Thinning and Other Forest Practices came into effect in May 2008. More funding is expected to be allocated for forestry based on this new law.
The Forestry Agency tried to introduce a new tax on water source forests in the fiscal 1986 tax system revision. The River Bureau of the Ministry of Construction tried to introduce system improvement with a water charge in 1985. The MAFF and Ministry of Construction tried to introduce a new tax on water, from which income would be used for forest improvements and river development projects in the fiscal 1987 tax system revision. All of these tax revision plans failed to pass (Banba 2004).
Reasons for introducing a regional environmental tax include the deterioration of local government finances and the promotion of decentralization policies under the Omnibus Decentralization Act of 2000 (Fujita 2008).
In Kochi Prefecture the main objectives of a new regional tax are to promote public participation in forest improvement projects and related activities (Matsushita et al. 2004). Furukawa (2004) noted that the tax in Kochi includes various measures that reflect residents’ intentions. An important characteristic of regional environmental taxes related to forests is that they represent a participative taxation system (Fujita 2008).
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank Ms. Sherry Nakanishi for her helpful comments on a draft of this paper. We also thank Dr. Steve Harrison and two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments and recommendations.
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Matsushita, K., Taguchi, K. The Kyoto Protocol and the Private Forest Policy of Local Governments in Japan. Small-scale Forestry 10, 19–35 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11842-010-9128-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11842-010-9128-9