Page 133 - Changing Living Spaces

Utilization of Grass and Wood in Common-Use Imperial Land

and to spread the idea of forestry. The Forest Policy Department would
be mainly responsible for (1) and (2), and the Afforestation Department
for (3), with a Bachelor of Law and a Bachelor of Forestry, respectively, in
charge. As a result, ‘Division 6’ was newly established in June 1902 (Meiji
35) and Otosaku Saito was appointed as the first head of the Division.
However, no persons with a Bachelor of Law degree were hired and the
Forest Policy Department and Afforestation Department were not creat-
ed; instead, the Forestry Section and the Survey Section were established.
In 1905, Division 6 was renamed the Forestry Division, but the duties of
the Division did not change significantly at the time of its establishment
(Yamanashi Prefecture 1922, 131).
The reasons why Saito was appointed as the first Division Head are
as follows (Takemoto 2021b): he was born in Niigata in September 1866
(Keio 2) and worked for the Forestry Bureau as soon as he graduated
from Tokyo Norin Gakko Ringaku-bu [Tokyo Agricultural and Forestry
School’s Forestry Department] in 1890 (Meiji 23), which was the first for-
estry school established in Japan. (Its present name is Department of
Forest Science, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Tokyo.) Later, when
the Sino-Japanese War broke out, he served in the war and was appoint-
ed head of the education and police station at Linkipo in Taiwan in 1896.
The following year, due to difficulties during the Alishan Expedition, he
returned to Japan and temporarily moved back to his wife’s family home
in Ichikawa, Yamanashi Prefecture.
On this occasion, Saito was confronted with a major flood disaster that
killed more than 150 people in the prefecture. Based on this experience,
he wrote his ‘Opinion on Flood Control in Yamanashi Prefecture’ in the
Yamanashi Nichinichi Shimbun [Yamanashi Daily News]. He strongly advo-
cated the incorporation of the devastated sanrin into conservation for-
ests, using the Forest Act that had just come into effect, on the grounds
that ‘the cause of the floods is solely due to the deforestation of sanrin for-
ests’ (Saito and Aoshima 1899). Saito presented statistical data and point-
ed out that there were also many treeless areas in the imperial forests
that should be converted into conservation forests. He also called for tak-
ing modernization measures, such as introducing laws to control forest
fires, organizing grass mountains, promoting afforestation and holding
tree planting days in elementary schools. At the same time, he showed
consideration for local residents who used the grassy mountains for fer-
tilizer and fodder by proposing specific and detailed measures to avoid
inconvenience to them. However, after this contribution, he was trans-

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