Factor Analysis of Depopulation in Kaga City in Ishikawa Prefecture (Japanese)

Kaga City in Ishikawa prefecture is the only designated disappearing city as appointed by the Commission on Decreasing Population (Leader: Hiroya Masuda, former Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications) of the private research institute, Japan Policy Council. This paper uses Kaga City as a model and tries to understand precisely the current state of population decline and empirically analyzes its determinants. In order to draw up an economic stimulus plan with appropriate priorities that would achieve regional revival without resorting to pork-barrel tactics, this paper deciphers the cause of the depopulation. According to the preliminary results from the national census in 2015, the population of Ishiakawa prefecture is 1,154,343, which is a decrease of 15,445 (-1.32%). Among the cities, Kaga experienced the greatest decrease of 4,652 people, which amounts to 30.2% of the entire population decrease of Ishikawa prefecture. In order to increase the population, this study proposes three strategies. First, we encourage the manufacturing industry to pay the highest wages and provide long-term employment. Second, generating active shopping centers is the key as this is the biggest problem facing most women. Third, we point out the importance of promoting the tourism industry, especially focusing on visitors from Japan and Taiwan.