Japan Govt Plans Scheme to Increase People’s Ties to Regional Areas; Cabinet to Approve Regional Revitalization Draft

The Yomiuri Shimbun

16:29 JST, June 2, 2025

The government plans to encourage people to register their favorite municipalities outside of where they live under a new scheme, targeting 10 million registrants. The scheme is included in its draft basic plan for promoting regional revitalization, a flagship policy of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.

The draft plan also calls for doubling the number of young people settling in rural areas and creating regions that can remain economically viable even as their populations decline, according to sources.

As part of measures to address the overconcentration of the population in Tokyo, the so-called hometown resident registration system is an attempt to increase the number of people who have an ongoing connection with regional areas.

According to the draft plan, those who select their preferred municipalities and register as “hometown residents” via a dedicated smartphone app can use facilities within that region on the same terms as residents. Municipalities can also utilize the system to share information about events and recruit volunteers.

These hometown residents make up the “related population,” those who stay engaged with their hometowns or other regional communities. They are neither part of the “settlement population” – those who have move to the area – or the tourists that make up the “exchange population.”

The government in the draft has set a target of 10 million registrants and aims to have them sign up with multiple municipalities in order to reach 100 million registrations. The basic plan lists such goals as raising the labor productivity per worker in rural areas to the same level as in the Tokyo metropolitan area and utilizing artificial intelligence and digital technology to solve regional issues.

Other policies to be implemented before the end of fiscal 2034 are also outlined in the draft, which is expected to be approved by the Cabinet as early as mid-June. A comprehensive strategy is to be formulated by the end of this fiscal year.

A similar strategy was compiled in 2014, when Ishiba served as minister for regional revitalization, with a focus on countermeasures against population decline. The current plan, “Regional Revitalization 2.0,” aims for economic growth based on the assumption of population decline.

To encourage young people to relocate to regional areas, the government will expand the scope of its support to include those working in the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sector as well as the medical and welfare industries. The government, meanwhile, will solicit ideas from municipalities on the relocation of ministries and agencies to outside Tokyo.

It has also proposed the establishment of a cross-prefectural framework for public-private partnerships.

Under the “remodeling of the Japanese archipelago in the Reiwa era,” the government aims to create an environment that will attract investment in semiconductors and data centers. It will support small and midsize enterprises in regional areas with exports and overseas expansion and improve productivity in the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sector by utilizing AI and digital technology.