New frontiers in Japanese Forest Policy: Addressing ecosystem disservices in the 21st century

Abstract

Forests are a potential solution to numerous global environmental issues, and their restoration is widely pursued. Forty percent of Japan’s forests are planted forests. This has caused the common occurrence of forest ecosystem disservices in the country, like—wildlife damage, pollinosis, and driftwood damage. Forest policy processes in Japan are characterized by incrementalism, central mobilization, and hegemony of career civil servants. Responses to forest ecosystem disservices have changed the central mobilization policy pattern. Punctuated equilibrium theory can be applied to several policy processes in Japan, but it provides only limited explanation for policy responses to forest ecosystem disservices. The responses are influenced by national governance and public administration traditions and cultures. It is relevant to expand research on policy responses to forest ecosystem disservices, recognizing that ideal responses may require unusual approaches not within traditional policy making or outside of established policy cultures.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13280-021-01566-2.

Introduction

Forests have been hailed as a solution to several global environmental problems. Restoring some 900 million ha of forests or the planting of one trillion trees is expected to make major inroads in reducing atmospheric carbon and avoid climate change catastrophes (Bastin et al. 2019). The looming global water crisis and biodiversity mass extinction have equally prompted calls for wide-scale tree planting (Holl and Brancalion 2020). Similar forest restoration suggestions have been made to contribute to rural livelihood improvements and several other development outcomes entailed in the Sustainable Development Goals (Katila et al. 2019).

At the same time, warnings have been given about potential negative environmental and social outcomes of massive tree planting (e.g. Malkamäki et al. 2018; Holl and Brancalion 2020). Large area forest restoration has already occurred in a significant number of countries, and as a result they experienced forest transition. Quite a few are examples of recent origin, i.e. China, Korea, India, and the Philippines. Many countries are on the threshold of passing the forest transition inflection point, because of effective efforts to reduce deforestation and forest restoration programs (de Jong et al. 2017).

The negative outcomes of accelerated forest restoration can be captured with the concept of ecosystem disservices (c.f. Dunn 2010; Ango et al. 2014). Those include, for instance, pests, litter, deterioration of infrastructure, diseases, animal attacks, allergenic and poisonous organisms, floods and wildfires (Davis 2006; Von Döhren and Haase 2015; Purnomo et al. 2017; Radeloff et al. 2018; Ravensbergen et al. 2020). Forests can be the origin of lethal viruses such as Ebola and damaging or dangerous wildlife (Rulli et al. 2017; VerCauteren and Hygnstrom 2011; Schley et al. 2008).

An expected accelerated global expansion of planted forests over the next decades (e.g. Lamb 2018) will result in an accumulative provision of cultural, regulatory, and provisional forests ecosystem services. But it can conceivably be expected that it will increase forest ecosystem disservices. The latter requires unique policy and public administration adjustments. In this paper we assume that one of the future forest policy challenges in multiple locations in the world will be how forest policy and public administration can address forest ecosystem disservices challenges from forest expansion that has been the outcome of international and related national forest restoration programs.

This paper addresses the major question, what are the implications of forest ecosystem disservices for forest policies and public administration of forests? It reviews the case of policy adjustment to address forest ecosystem disservices in Japan that can be linked to the expansion of its planted forest area in recent decades. The paper explores the effects of forest ecosystem disservices for society, and what are the related policies, public administration, and management challenges to address those. Specifically, the paper aims to contribute answers to the following research questions:

1. What are most problematic forest ecosystem disservices of the forests of Japan?

2. How are these forest ecosystem disservices linked to past and more recent choices by policies, public administration, and management of forests?

3. How much are these policies, and administration and management of forests of Japan determined by the country’s overarching government political decisions and specifically public sector governance?

4. What options to address the forest ecosystem disservices are discussed and do these options have implications for forest policies and public administration of the forest sector?

Analytical framework

Governance of forest ecosystem disservices

The analysis of this paper embraces two central concepts that need to be aligned with each other. The first is ecosystem disservices. The term is derived from the term ecosystem services, which the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) defines as benefits that ecosystems provide to people. Ecosystem disservices are characterized by von Döhren and Haase (2015) as harmful effects to human wellbeing. The concept, ecosystem disservices, is not as commonly accepted as ecosystem services, although its appearances in the academic literature is increasing. But, until date, ecosystem disservices remain poorly explored (von Döhren and Haase 2015). Since the adoption of ecosystem services as an analytical concept to understand the dependence relationship between people and nature, new explorations have been undertaken to reorient natural resources governance thinking, including forest governance, as ecosystem services governance (e.g. Primmer et al. 2015). These efforts, for instance, have tried to link different types of ecosystem services to distinct actors depending on differences in interests, mandate and know-how (Primmer et al. 2015). It has also contributed to the development of socio-ecological systems thinking (Ostrom 2009; Ceauşu et al. 2019). Little effort, however, so far has been made to explicitly analyze governance of ecosystem disservices. To address this shortcoming, Ceauşu et al. (2019) suggest including ecosystem disservices as a subsystem of the socio-ecological system framework.

Incorporating ecosystem disservices in the forest policy domain

A second central analytical concept of our analytical frame is policy. Both the ecosystem services concept and socio-ecological systems thinking are considered to have much relevance for policy making, because they improve cross policy integration across sectors, or the consideration of ecosystems and their contribution to human wellbeing in sectors or domains that are not directly linked to ecosystem services provision. In Japan, the Forestry Agency of the central government and forestry departments of prefectures and municipalities are the main actors in forest sector administration. Elected politicians, however, supervise those officials at the respective levels. Other ministries such as the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism also influence forest policy making. The National Diet, i.e., the national parliament, and prefectural and municipal councils have law-making and budget-sanctioning functions.

Because of the forestry governance structure and because of the overarching governance and public administration tradition and culture, Japan’s current forest policy is characterized by three distinctive features: (1) incrementalism and path-dependency, (2) a central mobilization style of achieving policy objectives, and (3) a hegemony of the career civil servants. Incrementalism indicates that a new policy is formulated and implemented on top of and without substantially changing past policies, by means of only small changes over time (Lindblom 1959; Wildavsky 1964). Kakizawa (2019) gives as an example the increased value attributed to regulating ecosystem services provided by forests, since the 1990s and 2000s, which did not lead to a drastic revision of the existing protection forest schemes, because that would have been costly, given the investments in organization, structure and regulations in the past—an influence of sunk costs. It also explains the strong path-dependence of contemporary forest policies and administration in Japan (Shiga 2016).

Because of the prevailing state-centered governance and public administration culture since early twentieth century career civil servants of both central and prefectural governments influence forest policy processes (Endo 2012). They present forest policy options to elected politicians since World War II until today. The politicians choose options but have no major involvement in formulating or amending those. This implies a de facto delegation of policymaking to career civil servants (Endo 2012).

Given that public policy and administration in Japan is recognized to be highly state- and bureaucracy-centered, this paper explores whether if the country’s forest policy tradition and culture can be captured by punctuated equilibrium theory (PET). PET explains policy processes as either policy stasis or incrementalism, and policy punctuation (Baumgartner et al. 2018). The dual foundation of PET is a combination of political institutions and bounded rational decision-making. Political institutions with subsystem politics, or issue networks, tend to maintain the status quo to protect existing interests. Decision-makers with limited attention spans and information processing capabilities cannot make an optimal decision, but rather ameliorate current policies so that they can muddle through given situations. Even though policies tend to remain usually the same, changes may occasionally occur. Key to such changes is “The interaction of changing images, and venue of public policies” (Baumgartner et al. 2018, p. 61). Dramatic events such as accidents change the images of issues in people’s minds, and the issue spills over to the arena of macro-politics, where politicians make significant decisions. Ecosystem disservices are events that require policy responses that go beyond simple managerial solutions or administrative interventions, and PET suggests there is resistance to those changes, unless ecosystem disservices become being perceived as dramatic events with sufficient public attention.

Using the above analytical frame, the paper reviews three cases of forest ecosystem disservices: wildlife disturbances, pollinosis that affects almost a third of the country’s population, and driftwood which causes major damages in rural and downstream urban areas. These ecosystem disservices related to plantation forestry are mentioned in the current National Forest Plan (approved by the Cabinet on October 16, 2018), indicating the three ecosystem disservices are of national importance and urgency (Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries 2018). Additionally, the three cases can directly be linked to the expansion of planted forest since WWII while other factors also have contributed to those problems (See Table 1). The review is based on information collected from public or policy documents and media reports, interviews conducted with policy experts, and observed situations on site (See the Appendix in the Supplementary Information). It qualitatively evaluates how policy responses to forest ecosystem disservices were similar to, or differed from, the existing patterns of forest policy.

Table 1.

Relationships between forest policy and ecosystem disservices in Japan

Timeline	Forestry policy and consequences	Wild animal nuisance	Cedar pollen issues	Driftwood
1950–1970s	Expansion of planted forests, restoring deforested lands and replacing natural forests	Newly created grasslands and young plantations provide habitat for sika deer and Japanese serows
Since 1980s	Planted cedar forests mature and massively produce pollen		Increase in pollen allergy among population
Since 2000s	Maturing of planted forests, and when landslides occur, larger trees cause driftwood problems			Disasters intensified by driftwood
Other potential causes		Depopulation of forested regions; decreased snow (Kaji 2012)	Climate change; Urbanization; Increased sensitivity to allergens among population (Saito 1999)	More intense rainfall

Japan’s forest expansion and the emergence of ecosystem disservices

Most of Japan’s vast areas of planted forests were established during the twentieth century. They amount to nearly 10 million hectares, or 40% of its total forest area of 25 million ha. The planted forests are dominated by Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica), Japanese cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa), and Japanese larch (Larix kaempferi), and are 31% national forests, 12% public (local government) forests, and 57% private forests (Forestry Agency 2019).

The expansion of Japan’s planted forests is linked to the country’s political modernization which began with the Meiji Restoration in 1868, which transformed the country’s feudal political structure into a centralized nation state. It brought an industrial revolution and the adoption of a capitalist economy. Historic tree planting had taken place in Japan, like for instance in Yoshino, south of Osaka (Totman 1998). Large-scale tree planting, however, started around the turn of the twentieth century to meet an increasing demand for timber. Post-World War II, economic recovery, and subsequent economic growth stimulated tree planting. Since the 1950s, farmers planted trees on their lands and became owners of small forest plots, and public agencies started planting trees under share-cropping schemes to invigorate local economies. During the 1950s through the 1970s, natural forest where previously fuelwood was harvested, was converted into timber plantations (Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute 2006, p. 166).

Since the 1950s and 1960s, Japan liberalized timber trade which resulted in a significant increase in timber imports. In 1955 imports amounted to 2.5 million m³ of timber, but 65.2 million m³ (96.1%) was produced domestically (Forestry Agency 2019: Documents IV-10). By 1996 imported timber increased to 90.5 million m³ and 23.8 million m³ (20.8%) came from domestic forests. To correct the imbalance of domestic produced timber versus imported timber, but also in response to a stagnant economic growth after the 1990s, policymakers have attempted to increase domestic timber production to stimulate forest industries. The Government of the Democratic Party of Japan launched, when in power from 2009 to 2012, a ‘Forests and Forestry Revitalization Plan’, to achieve timber self-sufficiency of 50% in 10 years (Nagasaka et al. 2016). The policy was continued by the Liberal Democratic Party, in power since 2012.

Governments of the country’s 47 prefectures play a major role in forest policy towards private forests, but under the guidance and support of the national Forestry Agency. The prefectures control 68% of the total of government forestry expenditures, central government 15%, and the country’s 1718 municipalities 17% (figures for 2017; Ministry of Finance 2018; Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications 2020). The trend is of shifting decision-making authority over forest policy and administration to municipalities, but they lack forestry expertise (Kakizawa 2019).

Some policies of the past still play a major role in contemporary policy decision, for instance, the mobilization of private, communal, and public forest owners and forest owners’ associations by the State Forestry Agency (Takahashi et al. 2017; Kakizawa 2019). These and other associations were compelled to join the expansion of planted forests since the 1950s, and take care of forest management, which ultimately failed to contribute to a self-reliant, market-oriented and economically sustainable forest sector.

Three cases of forest ecosystem disservices

Wildlife nuisance and damage

Recognizing the issue and policy responses

In the 1970s, Japan started to experience large-scale human-wildlife conflicts when Japanese serows (Capricornis crispus, a protected species [hereafter, p]) increasingly began foraging into and damaged tree plantations and agricultural crops (Ministry of the Environment 2010a). Consequently, the Environment Agency (now called Ministry of the Environment), the Agency for Cultural Affairs, and the Forestry Agency—agreed to designate conservation areas for the protection of wildlife species while outside these areas the culling of the species was permitted. Similarly, since the 1980s, damage caused by Sika deer (Cervus nippon; a hunted species [hereafter, h]) in agricultural fields and forests became frequent (Ministry of the Environment 2016a) (Figs. 1, 2). Large-scale replanting after clear-cutting created grazing locations for Sika deer, resulting in an accelerated population growth. Other wildlife causing similar nuisance include wild pigs (Sus scrofa [h]), Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata a non-hunted species [hereafter, nh]), and Asian black bears (Ursus thibetanus [h]) (Ministry of the Environment 2010b, 2016b, 2017). In response, the Ministry of Environment launched the Specific Wildlife Conservation and Management Plan in 1999 to assure appropriate wildlife conservation and management, to be based on scientific knowledge and to be implemented at the prefecture level.

Fig. 1.

Sika deer browsing on Mount Ryozen, Shiga Prefecture, Japan (Photo taken by Hidehiro Fujimoto on April 27, 2015)

Fig. 2.

Degraded undergrowth on Mount Ryozen, Shiga Prefecture, Japan (Photo taken by Hidehiro Fujimoto on April 27, 2015)

Persisting problems lead to the 2007 Act on Special Measures for Agricultural and Forestry Damages by Wildlife handing responsibility to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (Fig. 3). Municipal governments were given responsibility for the culling wildlife and building protective fences, with the national government subsidizing such activities. Following poor results, in 2013 the Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries agreed to halve Sika deer and Japanese wild pig populations by 2023. Subsidies were increased and efforts were made to boost the number of hunters.

Fig. 3.

Damages to agriculture and forestry due to wild birds and animals (F.Y. 2018; total 15 777 million yen (US $ 146 million; US $1 = 108 yen)) (Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries 2019)

The latter policies represented a significant progress in the areas of halting and preventing damage, while serious problems remain. Since rural economies are hit hard by damage caused by wildlife, a certain number of prefectural and municipal governments have individually launched programs to halt and prevent such damage. The use of products from captured wildlife, for example consumption of game or gibier, is also promoted. First, prefectural governments started to establish certification schemes under which products made from captured wildlife were promoted as souvenirs. A relevant national certification scheme was then initiated by the national government in 2018.

Policy implementation challenges

Under the 1999 Specific Wildlife Conservation and Management Plan, prefectural governments used management plans based on estimates of population sizes to pursue acceptable population densities of deer, serows, wild pigs, macaques, bears, and great cormorants (Phalacrocorax carbo [h]) (Ministry of the Environment 2013). Research funded by prefectural governments made science-based wildlife management the norm in policy making and implementation. The scheme was revised in 2014, and since then two plans, the Specific Wildlife Conservation Plan and the Specific Wildlife Management Plan either called for an increase or a reduction in population size, depending on the situation of a population.

The national government now funds damage prevention plans, established by municipal governments, directly without involvement of prefectural governments. The funds are used for culling and fence building, but also to create environments appropriate for wildlife, for instance by setting up buffer zones between forests and croplands. While the Specific Wildlife Conservation and Management Plans aim for the conservation of the species that cause the damage and reducing the damage itself, the parallel damage prevention efforts by municipalities only address damage reduction. The two schemes are harmonized through the requirement for municipal damage prevention plans to be compatible with the Specific Wildlife and Conservation and Management Plans.

A major challenge for the efforts to address wildlife damage is a declining number of hunters (The Japan Times 2019). To address this, the national government established a Designated Wildlife Culling Program as well as a Designated Wildlife Culling Entities Scheme along with the amendment of a corresponding act in 2014. Under these policy initiatives, entities with sufficient capabilities are permitted to engage in publicly funded culling activities and they are expected to play an active role in counterbalancing the declining number of hunters. At present, 145 entities have been authorized to undertake hunting activities.

Policy differences among prefectures, however, hinder the effective reduction of populations of wildlife species causing damage. On the other hand, several prefectures are coordinating to plan and implement culling cooperatively of populations that occupy territories crossing prefectural boundaries. The consumption of wildlife also has not yet increased as expected. Even though several associated model regions have been set up, only around 10% of the Sika deer harvested is currently utilized.

Currently, wildlife in Japan, which is causing damage is not generating economic benefits that compensate the damage. After World War II, wild animal populations, such as that of Sika deer, remained low and the level of utilization of wildlife was correspondingly low with small-scale niche activities such as recreational hunting. This resulted in the conviction that deer population rise would be merely a nuisance instead of an expanding resource with new economic opportunities, which resulted in opinions among policymakers that wildlife should be contained. Due to serious levels of intensive foraging by Sika deer and resulting damage in crops and forest regrowth, policymakers have tended to focus solely on lowering the population size. Since sufficient demand for game meat has not yet arisen, associated business models for the market are still in their infancy.

Policymakers are responding to the shortage of culling personnel by assigning them to designated wildlife culling entities. Such entities are publicly funded and have no incentives to market game meat. There is insufficient progress with boosting the number of hunters while the hunters in Japan are aging and their numbers are declining. Stringent gun ownership regulations are of particular significance in maintaining these trends. In addition, since the ownership of wildlife is not legally well-defined in Japan, even a mere discussion about who would benefit from wildlife or how wildlife could be utilized for regional development is difficult.

There is consensus among stakeholders that an integrative approach combining habitat management, population management and damage control is appropriate. However, specific guidelines on how to implement this combination, as well as to facilitate preparedness to wildlife damage among rural communities do not exist. As a result, an efficient allocation of resources among diverse programs in existence has not been provided. Preventative measures such as fences are technically effective. Nevertheless, a misconception persists that they are temporary, and even unnecessary in the long term. This is leading to a failure in implementing and assuring effective means of prevention. While local residents are widely expected to play a significant role in carrying out these measures, information on factors that hinder them from doing so is still lacking. A heavy reliance on local residents’ efforts could actually lead to a collapse of the prevention strategy. Considering such preconditions, one may conclude that a system of protective measures could be part of the social infrastructure of Japan. However, large scale discussions in society in this regard are yet to commence.

Pollen allergies from planted forests

Recognizing the issue and policy responses

Japanese cedar and Japanese cypress, which dominate Japan’s 10 million ha of planted forests cause serious allergies among people living near and far from such forests. Such allergies, referred to as pollinosis, is common elsewhere, for instance in Mediterranean countries (Charpin et al. 2005). It has been a persistent health issue in Japan since the 1970s, so much so that it has been discussed even at the National Diet (Ataka 2019). Cedar forests cause pollinosis including in Tokyo and Osaka (Kanazashi and Suzuki 2010), the two largest cities of Japan. Proposed measures include the thinning or pruning of cedar and cypress forests, to change to short-rotation forestry (Kiyono 2010),1 and replant with varieties that produce less pollen.

In 2006 the Tokyo Metropolitan Government began implementing such measures on a significant scale (Kameyama et al. 2018). Prefectural governments, however, respond to the pollinosis problem very differently. The minutes of prefectural assemblies record that the issue began to be discussed in Tokyo and other prefectures since the 1980s, 1990s or 2000s (Table 2) and that the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly discussed the issue more often than other prefectural assemblies (Fig. 4).

Table 2.

Discussion of pollinosis in prefectural assemblies

Adapted from Table 2–11 in Kawase (2017)

Fig. 4.

The number of minutes of Prefectural assemblies that included the keyword “pollen”.

Adapted from Table 2–2 in Kawase (2017). The periods under the names of prefectures represent the ones from which minutes were collected

The Prefectural assembly minutes identified pollinosis agenda items as either a ‘health issue’ or as a ‘forestry issue’ (Table 2). Multiple solutions were discussed and here we only review suggested forestry measures. The Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly discussed options such as injecting of chemicals into tree trunks as well as forest thinning. In recent years, harvesting of trees was considered when past measures were not effective. The assemblies of Okayama, Hyogo, Kyoto, and Fukui debated replacing cedar trees with cultivars with less pollen since the 1990s and 2000s, but only Okayama and Hyogo implemented such replacement. Other prefectures hesitated to pursue such replacement because investments for timber production are not profitable, especially of hardwood species. The prefectures of Nara and Osaka implemented medical measures to prevent or treat pollinosis. Nara did not opt for forestry-related measures, while Osaka debated forestry-related measures, but did not implemented those because the pollen that affected its people mostly originate in neighboring prefectures.

The right-most column of Table 2 represents the types of policy responses as of 2016. Overall the policy responses, especially in prefectures including major cities such as Tokyo and Osaka, suggest that the assemblies have much interest in the pollen issues, but how it was prioritized and what solutions were suggested differed very much among prefectures.

Policy implementation challenges

Finding cedar varieties with less pollen was a solution explored by multiple prefectures. Tokyo, Okayama, and Hyogo identified cedar varieties with less pollen among the varieties that they had at their disposal and began to increase the reproduction of such seedlings.2 Nara, Kyoto, and Fukui could not identify such a variety and mainly focused on the genetic improvement of cultivars that produce no pollen, despite the process being tedious and costly. Subsequently, Tokyo eventually began to replace its existing cedar forests with varieties that produced less pollen, but other prefectures did not do so. They could not produce seedlings with the required qualities within their own jurisdiction and opted for non-forestry options to ameliorate pollen allergy (Table 3).

Table 3.

Programs for replanting of cedar seedlings with less pollen

Adapted from Table 3–3 of Kawase (2017). Ordered according to the timing of the initial years. Titles are indicated with quotation marks. Programs that only involved development and production were excluded

Short-hand title	Title or description	Period
Tokyo Program	“Harvesting Program”	F.Y. 2006–2015 (New succeeding program exists)
Forestry Agency Program	“Forests with Lessor Pollen Program”	F.Y.2008–
Nara Program	Five percent subsidy addition for replanting	Since F.Y.2009
Okayama Program	Inter-prefectural collaboration	Since F.Y.2013
	“Manual for replanting cedar with lessor pollen, etc.”	Since F.Y.2014

Since the beginning of the Tokyo program in 2006, the area replanted has gradually increased,3 but the proportion of cedar trees with low pollen count remains small. The Tokyo program points at a new model for dealing with pollinosis that could also be effective in other prefectures. The Okayama program promotes the transfer of improved seedlings to other prefectures. The Forest Agency’s program to replant forests that contribute to a drop in pollinosis was poorly implemented because of budget limitations and low profitability of forestry, even though the agency has developed cedar varieties with less or no pollen.

In Osaka pollinosis is addressed as an intra-prefectural issue, limiting progress with replacing cedar plantings with low pollen varieties, because inter-prefectural coordination and cooperation progress slowly. An additional constraint is the complicated ownership of Japan’s forests and unclear property borders, which constrain prefectural governments to operate even within their own jurisdictions.

The damaging impacts of driftwood

Recognizing the issue and policy responses

Located in the Asian monsoon region, the Japanese archipelago receives a national average annual rainfall of 1600 mm and this can exceed 3000 mm in mountainous areas. Japan’s rivers run from high elevations of 2000 m to 3000 m to the ocean over short distances, contributing to the high incidence of landslides and floods. From ancient times, Japan has protected its forests and planted trees to reduce these risks (Totman 1998) and in modern times governments subsidize planting trees and constructing dams for soil conservation and erosion control. Compared to the 1950s, the incidences of shallow landslides and floods have decreased in recent decades (Mitsui 2009).

In recent years, the incidences of unexpected strong rains and sudden downpours are on the rise (Japan Meteorological Agency 2020), causing frequent landslides and the occurrence of driftwood (Ota 2017). In the 1950s driftwood was a valuable source of fuel to downstream residents, but nowadays it has become a serious cause of harm. Tree sizes have increased since the 1950s and driftwood becomes more easily trapped under bridges, it accumulates in hydroelectric dams, and obstructs fisheries or ocean navigation.

To address the issue, river engineers undertook research and in 2000 came up with proposals to adjust bridges and dams. Forestry departments of local governments in flood-hit areas identified monitoring zones (Gifu Prefecture) or identified locations of forest buffers along rivers (Mie Prefecture). Despite these efforts, the North Kyushu Flood on July 5, 2017 made the driftwood issue an item on the national policy agenda (Figs. 5, 6). The 2017 flood caused extensive damage and left 42 people dead or missing in areas along small or medium-sized rivers flowing into the Chikugo River. The precipitation of 545 mm in 24 h and up to 1000 mm in some locations caused multiple smaller and larger landslides of soil and rocks. Forest destruction was reported in 1077 sites, and resulted in widespread occurrence of driftwood, which got trapped underneath bridges and clogged up small and medium-sized rivers. Those overflowed, damaging roads, houses, and agricultural fields. The total amount of driftwood was approximately 190 000 m³ (Forestry Agency 2017a, b). An estimated 63% of the driftwood came from forests not close to rivers, 28% from valley forests, and 6% from floodplain forests (Kyushu Regional Development Bureau 2017). The driftwood damage was well covered by the mass media and on social networks, criticizing forest monocultures and insufficient thinning of forests as the main causes. The landslides indeed had occurred for 80% in planted forest areas.

Fig. 5.

Landslide on a hillside and damage to agricultural lands caused by driftwood (Photo taken by Noriko Sato on July 25, 2017 in Otsuru Area, Hita City, Oita Prefecture)

Fig. 6.

Soil, rocks, and driftwood intruding a residential house (Photo taken by Noriko Sato on August 11, 2017 in Masue Community, Asakura City, Fukuoka Prefecture)

Policy implementation challenges

Japanese forest investments from the central government prioritize soil conservation, involving the construction of dams, which are built within areas designated as protection forests under the Forest Law. Local or prefectural governments were addressing driftwood problems before the national government began doing so after the North Kyushu flood. For example, Gifu Prefecture designated areas where driftwood hazards were to be monitored. In Mie Prefecture and Nagano Prefecture, trees that likely may become driftwood in valley forests were removed and planted forests in valleys were intermixed with broadleaf trees, which reduce landslide risks. Planting broadleaf tree species, however, has not been widely adopted due to low profitability, while natural regeneration of hard wood trees is hindered by browsing by Sika deer. Prefectural governments also collaborate with citizens, for example, organized volunteers who collect driftwood and other waste. Furthermore, 36 prefectures in Japan collect forest taxes to be used for thinning and other maintenance to assure forests are well management and provide regulatory and cultural ecosystem services. The amounts collected, however, are small, and the measures to address driftwood problems are only on a trial basis.

After the 2017 flood, the Forestry Agency launched a working group on soil conservation to reduce driftwood, resulting in a section on measures against driftwood in the National Forest Plan of 2018. That year, the Forestry Agency announced the “Combined Preventative Soil Conservation Measures,” and in March 2019 issued the “Guidelines for Measures against the Down-flow of Soil, Rocks or Driftwood”. The recommended measures include combining of multiple soil conservation measures in several valleys into one coordinated project. Risk areas are to be identified using remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) technology, while local residents are asked to participate in monitoring. To reduce hazards, permeable, slit-type soil conservation dams will be built in addition to regular soil conservation dams. In 2019 soil conservation projects were prioritized and driftwood risk reduction projects are planned to be carried out in 1200 sites all over Japan in the coming years.

To address challenges like driftwood problems, policy coordination and integration (Candel and Biesbroek 2016) is called for among forestry, land use and river management agencies. The predicted more frequent strong rains and landslides cannot be stopped with forest management measures alone. Policy options that may need to be considered include capturing driftwood upstream and modifying the structure of bridges, so that driftwood will not accumulate there. It requires coordination between the Forestry Agency belonging to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery and land use and river management agencies, belonging to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. In addition, coordination is needed with the Ministry of the Environment to assure that post-disaster reconstruction efforts take scenic beauty and biodiversity of the area into consideration. In summary, addressing driftwood problems in Japan requires complex policy cooperation and integration between different ministries and agencies that are part of a single ministry.

Knowledge on forest management practices that help prevent landslides and reduce driftwood is still quite limited (e.g. Huang et al. 2018) and this knowledge likely will need to be developed by implementing agencies or in collaboration with third parties. Current policies implemented by the Forestry Agency and prefectural actors promote the optimization of wood production to make the sector cost effective. Alternative options, close to nature forest management, can be expected to reduce the incidence of landslides and driftwood problems (Huang et al. 2018), but these changes will reduce timber revenues. In addition, innovative forms of collaborative policy design or forest management that involves forest owners and local residents will need to be pursued (Forestry Agency 2019). In the northern Kyushu areas worst hit by the 2017 flood, several trial programs such as the utilization of driftwood and the conversion of planted forests into broadleaf trees with appeal for their vibrant autumn colors are now being started.

Discussion

Following the results from the three cases above, we ascertain here whether they correspond to incremental and path-dependent policy design and implementation, whether they correspond to a central mobilization style of achieving policy objectives, and how large the role is of career civil servants as compared to those of political decision-makers. Following this argumentation, the question surges if policy responses can be considered a departure from common traditional patterns and in that case if these developments can be explained as a policy punctuation, i.e. dramatic events that cause dramatic change in slow, incremental policy processes, driven by central mobilization and driven by career civil servants.

The three cases of forest ecosystem disservices reviewed here demonstrate characteristics of incremental and path dependent policy design and implementation. To address wildlife and forestry/agriculture issues, measures focused on technical solutions such as building fences or controlling populations, but not, for instance, on nature-based solutions such as developing forest ecosystems that are compatible with wildlife and other land uses. Even though the policies on wildlife management under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of the Environment changed significantly, for example when progressively novel science-based approach were adopted, policies related to wildlife management undertaken by the Forestry Agency did not change drastically, for instance in the case of the continuation of protective measures for plantation forests against wildlife. In the case of pollen allergies, fundamental policy changes like converting of single species forests into mixed coniferous and broadleaf forests were not actively pursued by state nor by prefectural governments. Similarly, no fundamental changes in forestry measures were pursued to address the negative impacts of extreme weather events and driftwood damages. Addressing the driftwood problem would also require the conversion of cedar or cypress stands into mixed or pure broadleaf stands. Pursuing a change to mixed broadleaf stands implies a significant departure from current forest policies that now only result in gradual change.

The three cases do not provide conclusive evidence of central mobilization styles of policy making. This may be because of the local nature of the forest ecosystem disservices, responses to the issues initially being led by prefectural governments, and only later were they considered needing national government’s attention. Future developments may be that central mobilization type of policy responses may become dominant modes of policy design and implementation to address forest ecosystem disservices in the future. On the other hand, the authors agree with recent findings that deviations from the central mobilization style are becoming more frequent in policy making in Japan (Uchiyama and Kohsaka 2020).

As for the third characteristics of Japanese policy making, i.e. the dominance of the bureaucracy, policies that were devised to address the three cases of forest ecosystem disservices were indeed primarily formulated and implemented by career civil servants employed in respective government agencies, but at both prefectural and national levels. Politicians recognized that there were issues of ecosystem disservices, but the overarching picture is that they did not contribute actively to the formulation of policy options. In some instances, other types of players beside career civil servants have exerted certain influence on identifying and implementing policy options. For example, wildlife scientists could influence wildlife management policies by contributing to the formulation and implementation of the Specific Wildlife Conservation and Management Plans. This is a common phenomenon in European and North American countries, where forest and nature policy design and implementation nowadays is happening with wide reaching stakeholder involvement (Petheram et al. 2004). These forms of collaborative governance, however are still quite new in Japan, and they may be considered significant changes in forest policy design and implementation. The three characteristics of the Japanese policy processes (incrementalism and path dependency, central mobilization and career civil servants dominance) mostly remain the same. However, several changes are occurring. The patterns of central mobilization and hegemony of career civil servants show initial signs of change (Table 4).

Table 4.

Policy regime at the face of negative externalities according to Punctuated Equilibrium Theory

	Human-wildlife conflicts	Pollen allergy	Driftwood
Events	Persistent; mainly rural	Persistent; national (except for Hokkaido and Okinawa)	Dramatic; regional
Images; change in images	Negative; not much change	Negative; from obscurity to majority’s concern	Negative; from obscurity to serious concern
Policy venue	State and prefectural bureaucracy of environmental domain	State and prefectural bureaucracy of forestry and health care domains	State and prefectural bureaucracy of forestry, erosion control and river domains
Influence on policy regime	Several large changes	Small changes	Small changes
(1) Incrementalism, path-dependency	New scientific management scheme in wildlife management; Strong incrementalism in the core parts of forest policies	Strong tendency	Strong tendency
(2) Central mobilization	New regional management scheme in wildlife management; Strong central mobilization style in the core parts of forest policies	Local initiatives emerging	Local initiatives emerging
(3) Hegemony of career civil servants	New participatory management scheme in wildlife management; Strong in the core parts of forest policies	Strong tendency	Strong tendency

To elaborate on this, we first examine the reasons why forest policy patterns in Japan are resistant to change, even when faced with quite dramatic forest ecosystem disservices as described in the three cases of the paper. Underlying are the particular governance and public administration culture and traditions. Related to the latter, Haley (1991) argued that in Japan the state with authority lacks the power to enforce its will, and, therefore, “can only assure effective enforcement of policy to induce desired action through influence and inducement to win consent” (p. 193). This pattern of rule, consensual governance, “is the product of institutional history and cultural choice, not intentional political choice” (p. 193). Therefore, winning the consent of affected people is necessary for policy change.

Related to forestry issues, historically, rural villages were the places where consent was given to a wide range of ruler or government proposals, but currently, due to urbanization and depopulation in rural areas, rural villages are finding it difficult to create consent to changes. The forestry sector, in fact, operates in similar way and can be compared to a modern-day 'village', one in which the state needs to obtain consent before it can formulate and implement policies. One of the main reason why policies that affect the forest sector still remain significantly within the three typical characteristics of Japanese policy processes (incrementalism and path dependency, central mobilization and career civil servants dominance) is because the Forestry Agency and other government bodies do not have skills or access to procedures to obtaining consent for change from the stakeholders with an interest in the issue at hand. Even though the Forestry Agency holds sway over bureaucrats at several administrative levels, its power to force citizens to take certain actions, most notably forest owners, is surprisingly weak.

The cases of forest ecosystem disservices in Japan and policy responses suggest that forest ecosystem disservices do not constitute dramatic events that cause radical changes in the slow, incremental policy processes that have characterized forest policies design and implementation since the beginning of the modern Japanese state. A plausible explanation for the absence of dramatic forest policy reforms in response to forest ecosystem disservices is that despite the widespread relevance and a fair amount of public interest in nuisances caused by forests, it remains a topic that is by many considered as needing to be addressed near or inside forests. It is recognized as an issue within the competence and authority of specialized agencies and a rather smaller group of forest stakeholders. As shown in Table 4, policy venues have not expanded to the extent that public interest in such issues has increased.

The case of forest ecosystem disservices resulting from past accelerated forest expansion of Japan provides some insights that have wider relevance. An increase of 350 million of restored forests until 2030, as is aimed for by the Bonn Challenge, or the planting of one trillion trees, if feasible at all, will yield forest ecosystem services but also result in forest ecosystem disservices, similar or quite different from those analyzed in this paper. This will impose challenges for forest policies or public forest administration. This is an issue that is not at all recognized in the ever more prominent international, but also national forest restoration discourses and narratives. Policy and public administration responses to new forest ecosystem disservices are determined by the characteristics of the disservices, but also by national, and even regional prevailing policy and public administration culture and tradition.

This study has a limitation as a historical policy analysis at the national level. Future research should address ecosystem disservices resulting from forest restoration and commonalities and differences in responses in locations at local levels. In addition, interlinkages among policies toward different types of disservices should be investigated. The three prevailing characteristics of policy formation in Japan should be also re-examined. It is needed to study the barriers and drivers of the (combined) role and interplay of the three issue areas in influencing possible forest policy changes in Japan.

Conclusion

Japan has created large areas of planted forests since the country became a modern state following the Meiji Restoration. This, but also past and more recent forest policies, administration and management have resulted in forest ecosystem disservices having become a common phenomenon in Japan’s forests while the recent extreme weather events largely contributed to driftwood damages. Responses to forest ecosystem disservices have shown strong characteristics of incrementalism, central mobilization, and hegemony of career civil servants. Forest ecosystem disservices have changed the central mobilization policy formulation and implementation style of the characteristics of the Japan governance and public administration only to a limited extent. This suggest that forest policy of Japan per se, cannot adequately be explained using punctuated equilibrium theory, although the latter may apply to other policy domains.

Planted forests may cause a continuation of ecosystem disservices in the future such as pollinosis and driftwood, and possibly conflicts with wildlife. This is a relevant issue to consider, for instance in the current global drive for large scale forest restoration (de Jong et al. unpublished results). Restored forests will not only provide ecosystem services, but forest ecosystem disservices may also result from successful forest restoration. What kind of disservices eventually emerge and how severe they are is determined by choices that are made quite early in forest restoration efforts, but also by what kind of responses are devised at later moments. The paper finds that responses to forest ecosystem disservices often follow existing patterns of forest policy processes and they are not given sufficient attention. Ideal responses may be formulated and implemented by policy regimes different from the traditional ones. Not only technological solutions, but also exploring innovations of policy formation and implementation is an indispensable part of improved responses to forest ecosystem disservices.

Supplementary Information

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Biographies

Takuya Takahashi

is a Professor at the University of Shiga Prefecture. His research interests include payment for ecosystem services, well-being effects of forests, and management of common forests.

Wil de Jong

is a Professor at Kyoto University. His research interests include forest governance and policies and forests and local development.

Hiroaki Kakizawa

is a Professor at Hokkaido University. His research interests include the comparison of forest policies of industrialized countries.

Mari Kawase

is a former Ph.D. student at Kyoto University. Her research interests include policy processes surrounding cedar pollinosis and production of tree seedlings.

Koji Matsushita

is an Associate Professor at Kyoto University. His research interests include the management of former common forests and statistical analysis of forest land management.

Noriko Sato

is a Professor at Kyushu University. Her research interests include forest policy and local communities in mountainous areas.

Atsushi Takayanagi

is an Associate Professor at Kyoto University. His research interests include the management of wild animals, and community response strategies toward wild animals.

Author contributions

TT designed and organized the study. WJ contributed to Sections 1, 2 and 4 and to a minor degree to Sect. 3. HK contributed to theoretical formulation of the study. AT is the main contributor to the case study of human-wildlife conflicts. MK and KM are the main contributors to the case study of pollen allergy. NS is the main contributor to the case study of driftwood.