Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

CHANGE OF THE MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY IN ASHIKAGA

1972; Association of Japanese Geographers; Volume: 45; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.4157/grj.45.297

2185-1735

Takaaki KUSAKABE,

Urban and spatial planning

The city of Ashikaga is situated in the northern Kanto District, and is an industrial city of Tochigi Prefecture with 156, 000 population. During World War II, kijaku (fabric for kimono), or so-called 'Ashikaga meisen', became nearly extinct. Ashikaga started producing "tricot", and by now, it has become so prosperous as to produce as much as one-third of the total production of Japan. Here the tricot cloth is made into many kinds of laungery, underwear and outer wear. With the increase in the production of tricot, other kinds of textile industry have also developed and now Ashikaga has become a center for all kinds of textile. The city of Ashikaga created the largest shipment value among the inland cities in the northern Kanto District in 1066 by operating modernized textile industry and the industries that were converted from war industries to peace industries such as machine, metal, rubber and plastic. Machine and metal factories in the city were producing various kinds of parts of airplanes for military use during World War II. Later many factories moved into Ashikaga one after another from the Keihin District, resulting in a great tide of industrialization in the Ryômô District, in which Ashikaga is functioning as the largest manufacturing center. As a consequence, Ashikaga's nature which used to be noted for its traditional textile producing region has been fading away very rapidly. In spite of the increase in industrial production the population has not increased greatly. This is considered to be due to the fact that labor has transferred from the textile industry into the industries which came to settle in Ashikaga recently.