Agricoltura ed economia rurale in Giappone tra le due guerre mondiali: una rilettura delle statistiche ufficiali

Despite a steady industrialisation having taken place since the Meiji era, Japan remained a largely rural country until the 1950s. Seeing as the share of the population employed in agriculture declined at a much slower pace than the agriculture industry’s share of national income, a serious “rural question” emerged in the interwar period. This paper reconsiders established views on the economic condition of farmers in those two decades by analysing the official surveys on family budgets. These sources have been quoted in several studies, but pose some methodological problems that the current paper tries to overcome. The discussion shows how adjusted data on the composition of income and living expenses can usefully complement macroeconomic statistics.