First Survey in 5 Years on Community Conditions in Depopulated Areas! - Publication of "Survey on Community Conditions in Depopulated Areas" Results

Results of the survey on community conditions in depopulated areas published by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism and the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications on August 8, 2025. Surveying population trends as of April 2024, it identified current conditions of 78,485 communities in 1,085 municipalities in disadvantaged areas, with a community population of 14.329 million and an average population per community of 184.9 people. The proportion of communities where more than half of residents are 65 years or older is 40.2%, an increase of more than 10 percentage points from the previous survey, indicating serious aging. Over five years, the number of communities decreased by 0.9% and community population decreased by 7.5%, with 296 communities becoming uninhabited and 617 communities decreasing due to community reorganization. Municipal trend predictions show 73.8% will continue to exist for the time being (down 12.5 percentage points from 86.3% in the previous survey), 4.2% may become uninhabited eventually, and 0.6% may become uninhabited within 10 years. Communities at risk of becoming uninhabited show severely insufficient living service functions with 3.6% having stores/supermarkets and 1.7% having hospitals/clinics. Community support staff activities have expanded to 28.8% of communities and regional development cooperation members to 22.0%. Support personnel activities are expanding.