Geography

Location: Eastern Asia, island chain between the North Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Japan, east of the Korean Peninsula

Geographic coordinates: 36 00 N, 138 00 E

Area:      - total: 377,835 sq km

- land: 374,744 sq km

- water: 3,091 sq km

note: includes Bonin Islands (Ogasawara-gunto), Daito-shoto, Minami-jima, Okino-torishima, Ryukyu Islands (Nansei-shoto), and Volcano Islands (Kazan-retto)

Coastline: 29,751 km (no land boundaries)

Maritime claims: - excl. economic zone: 200 nm

- territorial sea: 12 nm; 3 nm in the in­ternational straits - La Perouse or Soya, Osumi, Tsugaru, and Eastern and West­ern Channels of the Korea or Tsushi-ma Strait

Climate: varies from tropical in south to cool temperate in north

Terrain: mostly rugged and mountainous

Elevation extremes:

- lowest point: Hachiro-gata -4 m

- highest point: Fujiyama 3,776 m

Natural resources: negligible mineral resources, fish

Land use:     - arable land: 11%

- permanent crops: 1%

- permanent pastures: 2%

- forests and woodland: 67%

- other: 19% (1993 est.)

Irrigated land: 27,820 sq km (1993 est.)

Natural hazards: many dormant, some active vol­canoes; about 1,500 seismic occur­rences (mostly tremors) every year; tsu­namis

Environment - current issues: air pollution from power plant emissions results in acid rain; acidification of lakes and reser­voirs degrading water quality and threat­ening aquatic life; fish and tropi­cal timber exploitation contributes to the depletion of these resources.

Environment - international agreements: party to: Antarctic-Environmental Protocol, Antarctic Treaty, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Endangered Species, Environ­mental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Nuclear Test Ban, Ozone Layer Protec­tion, Ship Pollution, Tropical Timber 83 and 94, Wetlands; signed, but not rati­fied: Desertification.

People

Population: 125,931,533 (July 1998 est.)

Age structure:  (by years, July 1998 est.)

 -0-14: 15% (m: 9,802,921; f: 9,342,254)

-15-64: 69% (m:43,486,840; f:43,135,979)

- 65+: 16% (m: 8,388,242; f: 11,775,297)

Population growth rate: 0.2% (1998 est.)

Birth rate: 10.26 births/1,000 pop. (1998 est.)

Death rate: 7.94 deaths/1,000 pop. (1998 est.)

Net migration rate: -0.36 migrant(s)/1,000 pop. (1998 est.)

Sex ratio: - at birth: 1.05 male(s)/female

   - under 15 years: 1.05 male(s)/female

   - 15-64 years: 1.01 male(s)/female

   - 65 + years: 0.71 male(s)/female

Infant mortality rate: 4.1 deaths/1,000 live births (1998 est.)

Life expectancy at birth:

total population: 80 years

(male: 76.91; female: 83.25 - 1998 est.)

Fertility rate: 1.46 children/woman (1998 est.)

Nationality: noun: Japanese - adjective: Japanese

Ethnic groups: Japanese 99.4%, other 0.6% (mostly Korean)

Religions: observe both Shinto and Buddhism 84%, other 16% (incl. Christian 0.7%)

Languages: Japanese

Literacy (definition age 15+ can read and write): total population: 99% (1970 est.)

Government

Country name:     no conventional long form; conventional short form: Japan

Government type: constitutional monarchy

National capital: Tokyo

Administrative divisions: 47 prefectures; Aichi, Akita, Aomori, Chiba, Ehime, Fukui, Fu­kuoka, Fukushima, Gifu, Gumma, Hi­ro­shima, Hokkaido, Hyogo, Ibaraki, Ishi­kawa, Iwate, Kagawa, Kagoshima, Kana­gawa, Kochi, Kumamoto, Kyoto, Mie, Mi­yagi, Miyazaki, Nagano, Na­gasaki, Nara, Niigata, Oita, Okayama, Okinawa, Osaka, Saga, Saitama, Shiga, Shimane, Shizuoka, Tochigi, Toku­shima, Tokyo, Tottori, Toyama, Waka­yama, Yamagata, Yamaguchi, Yamana­shi.

Independence: 660 BC (traditional founding by Emperor Jimmu)

National holiday: Birthday of the Emperor, 23 December (1933)

Constitution: 3 May 1947

Legal system: modeled after European civil law system with English-US influence; judi­cial review of legislative acts in the Su­preme Court; accepts compulsory ICJ ju­risdic­tion, with reservations

Suffrage: 20 years of age; universal

Executive branch:

- chief of state: Emperor AKIHITO (since 7 Jan. 1989)

- head of government: Prime Min. Ryu-taro HASHIMOTO (since 11 Jan. 1996)

[note: an acting prime minister - determined upon a rotational basis - serves when the Prime Minister is out of the country]

- cabinet: appointed by the Prime Min.

Elections: none; the emperor is a constitutional monarch; the Diet designates the Prime Min.; the constitution requires that the Prime Min. must command a parlia­men­tary majority, therefore, following legis­lative elections, the leader of the majority party or leader of a majority coalition in the House of Representa­tives usually be­comes Prime Min.

Legislative branch: bicameral Diet or Kokkai consists of the House of Councilors or Sangi-in (252 seats; one-half of the mem­bers elected every three years - 76 seats of which are elected from the 47 multi-seat prefectural districts and 50 of which are elected from a single nation­wide list with voters casting ballots by party; members elected by popular vote to serve six-year terms) and the House of Repre­sentatives or Shugi-in (500 seats - 200 of which are elected from 11 regional blocks on a proportional repre­sentation basis and 300 of which are elected from 300 single-seat districts; members elected by popular vote to serve four-year terms)

Elections: House of Councillors - last held 23 July 1995 (next to be held July 1998); House of Representatives - last held 20 Oct. 1996 (next to be held by Oct. 2000)

Election results: House of Councilors - percent of vote by party - NA; seats by party - LDP 110, NFP 56, SDP 38, JCP 14, Sakigake 3, others 19, independents 12; note - the dis­tribution of seats as of April 1998 is as follows - LDP 118, DPJ 41, Komei 24, SDP 21, JCP 14, Liberal Party 12, Saki­gake 3, Reform Club 3, others 14, vacan­cies 2; House of Representatives - percent of vote by party - NA; seats by party - LDP 240, NFP 142, DPJ 52, JCP 26, SDP 15, Sun Party 10, others 15; note - the dis­tribution of seats as of April 1998 is as follows - LDP 261, DPJ 93, Liberal Party 40, New Peace Party 37, JCP 26, SDP 15, Reform Club 9, Saki­gake 2, others 17.

Judicial branch: Supreme Court, chief justice is appointed by the emperor after desig­na­tion by the cabinet, all other justices are appointed by the cabinet.

Political parties and leaders: Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), Ryutaro HASHIMOTO, presi­dent, Koichi KATO, Sec.-Gen.; So­cial Demo­cratic Party (SDP), Takako DOI, chairperson, Tada­to­shi AKIBA, Sec.-Gen.; Sakigake (Harbinger), Akiko DOMOTO, chair­person, Hiroyuki SONODA, Sec.-Gen.; Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), Naoto KAN, leader, Tsutomu HATA, Sec.-Gen.; Japan Com­munist Party (JCP), Tetsuzo FUWA, chairman, Kazuo SHII, Sec.-Gen.; Komei, Toshiko HAMAYOT-SU, chief; Liberal Party, Ichiro OZAWA, president, Takeshi NODA, Sec.-Gen.; New Peace Party, Takenori KAN­ZAKI, leader, Tetsuzo FUYUB­ASHI, Sec.-Gen.; Re­form Club, Tatsuo OZAWA, leader, Katsuyuki ISHIDA, Sec.-Gen.

note: subsequent to the last legislative elec­tions, the New Frontier Party (NFP) dis­banded; the Sun Party was formed by former NFP mem­bers, but later disbanded; the DPJ was formed by former members of the SDP and Sakigake and, in April 1998, was joined by three addi­tional parties which had formed after the NFP disbanded; Reform Club, New Peace Party, and Liberal Party were formed in January 1998 af­ter the NFP disbanded.

International organization participation: AfDB, AG (observer), APEC, AsDB, Australia Group, BIS, CCC, CE (observer), CP, EBRD, ESCAP, FAO, G- 2, G- 5, G- 7, G- 8, G-10, IADB, IAEA, IBRD, ICAO, ICC, ICFTU, ICRM, IDA, IEA, IFAD, IFC, IFRCS, IHO, ILO, IMF, IMO, Inmarsat, Intelsat, In­ter­pol, IOC, IOM, ISO, ITU, MTCR, NEA, NSG, OAS (observer), OECD, OSCE (partner), PCA, UN, UN Security Council (tempo­rary), UNCTAD, UNDOF, UNESCO, UNHCR, UNIDO, UNITAR, UNRWA, UNU, UPU, WFTU, WHO, WIPO, WMO, WToO, WTrO, ZC

Flag: white with a large red disk in the center (representing the sun without rays)

Economy

Economy-overview: Government-industry coop­era­tion, a strong work ethic, mastery of high technology, and a comparatively small de­fense allocation (ca. 1% of GDP) helped Japan advance with extraor­di­nary ra­pidity to the rank of second most powerful econ­omy in the world. One no­ta­ble characteris­tic of the econ­omy is the working together of manufac­turers, sup­pliers, and distribu­tors in closely-knit groups called keiretsu. A second basic feature has been the guar­an­tee of lifetime employment for a sub­stantial portion of the urban labor force; this guarantee is eroding. Industry, the most important sec­tor of the economy, is heavily dependent on imported fuels and raw materials. The much smaller agricul­tural sector is highly subsidized and pro­tected, with crop yields among the highest in the world. Usually self-sufficient in rice, Japan must import about 50% of its re­quirements of other grain and fodder crops. Japan maintains one of the world's largest fishing fleets and accounts for nearly 15% of the global catch. For three decades over­all real eco­nomic growth had been spec­tacular: a 10% average in the 1960s, a 5% average in the 1970s, and a 4% average in the 1980s. Growth slowed markedly in 1992-95 largely because of the aftereffects of over-in­vestment during the late 1980s and con­tradicting domestic policies in­tended to wring speculative excesses from the stock and real estate markets. Growth picked up to 3.9% in 1996, reflecting stimu­lating fis­cal and monetary policies as well as low rates of inflation, but in 1997 growth fell back to 1%. As a result of the expan­sion­ary fiscal policies and declining tax reve­nues due to the reces­sion, Japan has one of the largest budget deficits as a percent of GDP among the industrialized countries. The crowding of habitable land area and the aging of the population are two other major long-term problems.

GDP:      (1997 est.)

- purchasing power parity: $3.08 trillion

- real growth rate: 0.9%

- per capita purchasing power parity: $24,500

- composition by sector: agriculture: 2%; industry: 41.5%; services: 56.5% (1995)

Inflation rate -consumer price index: 1.7% (1997)

Labor force: - total: 67.23 million (March 1997)

- by occupation: trade & services 50%, manufacturing, mining & construction 33%, utilities & communication 7%, ag­ri­culture, forestry & fishing 6%, gov­ernment 3% (1994)

Unemployment rate: 3.4% (1997)

Budget: - revenues: $497 billion

- expenditures: $621 billion, incl. capital ex­pen­ditures (public works only) of ca. $72  billion (FY98/99 est.)

Industries: among world's largest and technologi­cally advanced producers of steel and non­ferrous metallurgy, construction and mining equipment, heavy electrical equipment, motor vehicles and parts, elec­tronic and telecommunication equipment, machine tools, automated production sys­tems, loco­motives and railroad rolling stock, ships, chemicals; textiles, processed foods.

Industrial production growth rate: 4.3% (1997)

Electricity: (1995)

- capacity: 199.878 million kW

- production: 930.55 billion kWh (1995)

- consumption per capita: 7,414 kWh

Agriculture: products: rice, sugar beets, vegeta­bles, fruit, pork, poultry, dairy products, eggs, world's largest fish catch of 10 mil­lion metric tons in 1991

Exports: - total value: $421 billion (f.o.b., 1997)

- commodities: manufactures 96% (incl. machinery 50%, motor vehicles 19%, consumer electronics 3%) partners: US 27%, Southeast Asia 17%, EU 15%, China 5%

Imports: - total value: $339 billion (c.i.f., 1997)

- commodities: manufactures 54%, food-stuffs and raw materials 28%, fossil fuels 16%

- partners: US 22%, Southeast Asia 15%, EU 14%, China 12%

Economic aid: donor: ODA, $8.3 billion (1998 est.; ODA and OOF commitments 1970-94 = $174 billion)

Currency: yen/¥ (Jan. 1998: ¥ per US$1=129.45)

Fiscal year: 1 April—31 March

Communciation & Transportation

Telephones: 64 million (1987 est.)

Radios: 97 million (1993 est.)

Television broadcast stations: 12,350 (1 kW or greater 196)

Televisions: 100 million (1993 est.)

Railways: total: 23,670.7 km

Highways: total: 1.16 million km

Waterways: about 1,770 km; seagoing craft ply all coastal inland seas

Pipelines: crude oil 84 km; petroleum products 322 km; natural gas 1,800 km

Ports and harbors: 21

Merchant marine: total: 738 ships (1,000 GRT or over); note: Japan owns an additional 1,534 ships (1,000 GRT or over), which operate under the registries of other countries (1997 est.)

Airports: 167 (1997 est.)

Heliports: 14 (1997 est.)

Military

Military branches: Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (Army), Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (Navy), Japan Air Self-Defense Force (Air Force)

Military age: 18 years

Military manpower: (1998 est.)

- availability: males age 15-49: 31,105,541

- fit for military service: males: 26,778,356

- males reaching military age annually: 808,846

Military expenditures: $48.5 billion (FY96/97) or 1 percent of GDP (FY96/97)

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