On the Japanese Colonized Villages in North Manchoukuo

Abstract

More than twenty years have passed since Japanese farmers began to take part in the colonization of Manchoukuo, but before the Manchuria Incident of 1931-2, their number was very small, the sphere of their colonization being confined to Kwantung Province and along the South Manchurian Railway, and they did not succeed well. Soon after the conflict in 1932, a plan for colonizing North Manchoukuo was started by a number of patriotically minded people, and although only a few years have elapsed since then the results are far beyond their expectations. The writer describes the land cultivated by Japanese in North Manchoukuo. In every cultivated land, in the early stages of colonization, almost all work, such as cultivating, harvesting, and even cooking, done cooperatively, with good results, but with advance in cultivation they gradually come to work independently of their comrades, and with their settlements taking the form of villages, cooperative life changes into ordinary private life; the cultivators take wives or get members of their families to come over from the homeland, and these families live an independent life on friendly terms with their neighbours. There are two kinds of Manchoukuoan colonizations, the one called class A is Govermental Colonization, managed by the Goverment, and the other class B, Free Colonization, not managed by the Goverment. For example, Iyasaka-mura and Tihuri-go come under the head of the former and Tenri-mura the latter. Today, govermental colonization is much larger in number, so this will be described first. The colonized villages in the early days-the first formed in 1932 and the second in 1933-consist of people from all parts of Japan, especially from the prefectures of North-East Japan, with the result that, now, on such cultivated land in North Manchoukuo, people from each prefecture form their own villages, such villages being named after the prefecture or the province in Japan whence they came (See Figs. 1-2). In such a village, people from certain cities or districts of Japan form their own communities (Fig. 3), and what is better, try to induce people in the homeland to colonize North Manchoukuo and establish their own branch villages or districts in that county. In this way new ground will be cultivated by people from the same districts in Japan whence they themselves came. The resulte of farming in a large number of such villages in Manchoukuo are as follows: (1) The result of farming by the colonists at the end of the first year of colonization, were on the whole better in new villages than in old ones (see Tables 1, 2, Fig. 4). (2) The newer a village, the larger the area of its rice-fields, but in the older villages there was a larger area of soy-bean fields (see Tables 2-4, Fig. 5). The number of Japanese in Manchoukuo has increased rapidly, and from the view point of income, rice is naturally the most inportant crop for every village, so that the area of rice-fields in every village increases every year. However, the newer a village, the larger the area of its rice-fields, while a larger area of soy-bean and other fields is found in the older villages (Fig. 5), which is because, in the early stage of colonization, rice cultivation most prevailed, but owing to the great extent of the farms the rice-fields were very overgrown with weeds, causing difficulties, until finally they were compelled to abandon rice cultivation when new land, suitable for rice, was not available. A large income may be derived from tobacco and kaoliang farming, but they soon impoverish rich soil, whereas soy-bean culture is not only very important, but it turns poor soil into rich, with the result that it is carried out with other cultivations to an increasing degree. (3) Generally speaking, a newer village has a better harvest than an old ones (see Tables 6-7). It is not yet clear, whether the reason for it is in the quality of the soil or in superior cultivation.