Page 214 - Changing Living Spaces

Masanori Takashima

3.00

2.50
Increase rate of agricultural output (%) 1.50

2.00

1.00

0.50

0,00
0.00 0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50
Increase rate of paddy fileds (%)

Figure 4 Increase of Agricultural Output vs Arable Land (Paddy Fields)
in the Latter Half of the Early Modern Period
Sources Table 8 and 9.
predominant commodity as tribute in the middle of the Tokugawa pe-
riod. However, the local daimyō encouraged the production of local spe-
cialties and sought to generate financial revenue by monopolising them
in their domain. In local cultivation areas, some farmers produced com-
mercial crops and purchased rice with the profits from the sale of com-
mercial crops; they did not produce rice for self-sufficiency (Honjo 1994;
Abe 1998).
Even when the Japanese archipelago is viewed from a broader per-
spective, the area of non-paddy fields in eastern Japan has not increased
significantly. This can be interpreted in two ways. First, the sericultur-
al industry in the mountainous areas has increased because of the high
productivity of non-paddy fields. Second, there has been an increase in
non-paddy fields, which are not cultivated land, in the sericulture indus-
try. In any case, it can be said that the increase in agricultural production
on non-paddy fields began in the latter half of the early modern period in
the region characterised by lands unsuitable for main grain production.

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