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- Convenors:
-
Peter Matanle
(University of Sheffield)
Julia Thomas (University of Notre Dame)
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- Stream:
- Urban, Regional and Environmental Studies
- Location:
- Torre B, Piso 3, T10
- Sessions:
- Thursday 31 August, -
Time zone: Europe/Lisbon
Short Abstract:
Presenting research from three geographical contexts in Japan, this panel explores the potential for depopulation to assist in reversing environmental losses arising from economic development and population expansion.
Long Abstract:
It is commonly agreed that global population expansion, economic development, and urbanisation in combination have had a catastrophic impact on Earth's natural systems. Climate change is under way, and bio-diversity losses are accumulating into the world's Sixth Great Extinction. Nevertheless, the developed world is undergoing a profound demographic transition that may deliver a shrinking world population by century's end. This prompts some to believe that depopulation will contribute to reversing the Earth's recent environmental losses. It's a seductive logic, but is it true?
Currently nearly all countries' populations are growing, and only a small number of countries have recently begun to shrink. Hence, there is little evidence available for testing these assumptions. Japan's population began to shrink in 2008, however more than half of its land area has been losing population since 1990. China, South Korea, Taiwan and others are expected to begin shrinking before 2030. Japan therefore offers fruitful insights into environmental processes from the perspectives of economic expansion and depopulation in the wider Asia-Pacific region.
This panel will bring together scholars from diverse disciplines and backgrounds to ask: Does depopulation deliver positive environmental outcomes? Chaired by Peter Matanle from the University of Sheffield, UK, the panel will present research from three environmental contexts in Japan to examine the relationship between population change and environmental stability. Fernando Ortiz-Moya of the University of Nottingham Ningbo, China, will present on urban environmental policy and depopulation in Kitakyushu City; Peter Siegenthaler from Texas State University will present on depopulation and tourism development pressures on environmental systems in small towns in Nagano and Gifu Prefectures; and Linas Didvalis of Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania, will talk about the impacts of depopulation on Japan's mountain forest environments. Julia Adeney Thomas from Notre Dame University, USA, will then discuss the three papers within the context of Japan's modern environmental history.
Our hope is that the panel can use this opportunity in Lisbon as a springboard to growing our research group and developing a substantial contribution to world knowledge on environment and demography in the Asia-Pacific region.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Thursday 31 August, 2017, -Fernando Ortiz-Moya (Institute for Global Environmental Strategies)
Paper short abstract:
Japan is naturally depopulating, and hence can serve to explore the depopulation dividend of a shrinking population. Using case study methodology, and focusing on Kitakyushu City, this paper explores the impact of depopulation and urban policies on the environment.
Paper long abstract:
In the context of growing concerns about environmental preservation and conservation, the 'over population' discourse points to the possible environmental benefits of lower population figures due to the correlation between population growth and the emission of greenhouse gases. However, urban studies have not adequately addressed the depopulation dividend—the possible benefits achievable from decreasing population figures—and how it can contribute towards sustainable goals. Because of its low birth rate and aged population, Japan is naturally depopulating, and hence can serve to explore the environmental impact of depopulation.
Focusing on Kitakyushu City, this paper studies the environmental impact of policies in response to depopulation. Kitakyushu was one of Japan's industrial powerhouses; its steelworks were responsible for the city's rapid population growth but also for severely damaging its environment. Since the 1960s deindustrialisation and environmental pollution worked as push factors triggering out-migration. The city's authorities, pushed by grassroots movements, hastened to respond to the double challenge of depopulation and pollution by implementing policies aiming at transforming Kitakyushu into a green city. Using case study methodology, including historical research and qualitative analysis of statistical data from official bodies -such as water quality of the city's major rivers, air pollutants, CO2 emissions or green area per capita, comparing this with the city's population change- this paper explores the impact of depopulation and urban policies on the environment.
Peter Siegenthaler (Texas State University)
Paper short abstract:
This research relies on promotional materials, maps, and journalistic articles to investigate relationships among depopulation, tourism promotion, sustainability and the effects of preservation activists' interventions toward the conservation of heritage architecture in two hamlets in rural Japan.
Paper long abstract:
It is widely understood that Japan's machinami hozon (townscape preservation) movement derives in large part from a localized sense of crisis in the 1960s concerning effects of depopulation on Japan's countryside. In two of the most prominent examples of townscape preservation efforts, Tsumago post-town in Nagano prefecture and the Gifu gasshô-zukuri hamlet of Ogimachi, leaders from the outset identified one of the local movement's goals as creation of a town that would retain its young people, and plans for tourism development were justified by reference to their potential to reverse depopulation. Over the course of nearly six decades, each town's preservation programs have been successful in economic terms, dramatically increasing visitor numbers and shifting the weight of economic activity toward the hospitality industry. Less clear is whether such programs' successes have effectively stemmed the outflow of population from these rural towns, or rather have in effect benefited from a "depopulation dividend" by which demographic changes heighten the appeal of the rural areas in which the sites are found.
In each site, one sees a troubled relationship between population stability and environmental sustainability. In Tsumago between 1967 and 1972, the annual number of visitors grew from 17,000 to 541,000, a dramatic increase that put overwhelming pressure on the town's physical and social infrastructure. In Ogimachi, the movement's economic success was similarly dramatic, but as recognition of the town's picturesque architecture earned it designation as a World Heritage Site, increased demand for visitor-centered facilities prompted construction of a substantial highway close to the old hamlet's center.
At a glance, it seems Ogimachi's intrusive development has not delivered a depopulation dividend, while Tsumago's pioneering protection schemes have done so. Drawing on promotional publications, coverage of preservation activities in journalism and scholarship, and observations from participants in each town's preservation organizations, this research investigates the observable differences in the environmental effects of each town's preservation schema. Characteristics of the site itself, attitudes and aptitudes of local leaders, the nature of outside advising, and the timing of events in each location contribute to the human interventions affecting environmental stability in relation to depopulation.
Linas Didvalis (Vytautas Magnus University)
Paper short abstract:
By combining different scenarios of demographic change and current trends of national forest management policies, the paper seeks to evaluate how decrease in rural population in Japan may affect environmental functions of country's forests.
Paper long abstract:
With 70% of the territory covered by forests and continuously decreasing rural population during the past 20 years, Japan is a good case to explore both current and potential effects that depopulation can have on natural environment. More specifically, this paper focuses on impacts that depopulation has on Japan's forests, and seeks to evaluate a widespread yet controversial argument that decrease in human population is overall beneficial for the environment because it provides a variety of "depopulation dividends". The argument is examined by taking a combined rural and environmental studies approach and analysing short-term and long-term impacts of reduced human activity on forest ecosystems in Japan in terms of carbon sequestering, biodiversity, and soil and water conservation.
The paper consists of three main parts. The first one discusses complicated relationship between depopulation and human impact to the natural environment, with special attention to forests and peculiar characteristics of human-forest interaction. The second part looks at changes of work force involved in forestry industry in Japan since 1945, and how fluctuation of human activity affected environmental functions of country's forests. The final part employs these lessons of the past to create a model of what we can expect to happen with forests in Japan when human involvement in forest management gradually diminishes in the upcoming decades.
The paper applies existing research done by such scholars as Tomomichi Kato, Ayaka Kishimoto, Yuichi Yamaura and many others on carbon accumulation, belowground carbon allocation and biodiversity dispersion in different types of Japan's forests, as well as analysis of the effects of forest harvesting to soil erosion and water resources. This existing knowledge is combined with different scenarios of demographic change and current trends of national forest management policies to create projections how decrease in rural population may affect environmental functions of Japan's forests.