Asset Management of
Agricultural Irrigation Facilities
Japanese unique water management system, built by our ancestors over 2,000 years
The network of waterways, stretching some 400,000 km (ten times around the earth) across this narrow plain, has created a prosperous society in Japan, not only for paddy fields but also for maintaining a rich ecosystem, preventing floods, and providing water to support people's seasonal lifestyles.
Many foreigners who visited Japan at the end of the Edo period were amazed by this highly technical water use system and praised the elaborate paddy-field society shaped by the waterways. Even in the age of buildings and bullet trains, these waterways have continued to be protected by farmers, with few changes to the flow paths.
Now, the 21st century has arrived. The world's food problems are becoming more pressing, and the mass-production, mass-consumption society of the past must be replaced by a recycling-oriented society. Japan's 'paddy fields,' created by this network of waterways, are now attracting attention domestically and abroad as the basis for a stable food supply and as an activity that promotes the cycle of nature.
Water has always been the source of all societies, all lifestyles, and all industrial activities. It is no exaggeration to say that the agricultural water facilities that have supported this cycle are "undeniably Japanese assets."
To pass this asset
on to the next generation
※The upper page image photograph: "Tsujunkyo Bridge" Kumamoto Photo by (C) Tomo.Yun (http://www.yunphoto.net)