Japan: Sick from monoculture tree plantations

The cloud of pollen that usually covers Japan in the Springtime is disappearing and the Japanese are starting to feel more relieved from their respiratory allergy that leaves one out of six inhabitants of the Archipelago with red eyes and a congested nose. It is even worse in the cities due to the combination of pollen with release of gases from vehicles. In the last 10 years, in Tokyo, the proportion of population affected by allergies has risen from 7% to 20%.

Forty years ago, this did not happen. What has changed? The reply is to be found in forest degradation and loss. The modernisation process has implied a change in the way of looking at the forest. Its spirit, once a source of religious, architectonic, poetic and artistic inspiration has been taken away. Today, turned into merchandise, it is mainly a source of energy and building materials. And of allergies.

World War II swallowed half the forests, and in 1950 a policy for systematic reforestation was installed, centred on the plantation of fast growing conifers, especially Cryptomeria, a species which is more profitable for building. Thus presently there are 10 million hectares planted with a single species of conifer, which is at the root of the Spring pollen cloud.

These enormous monoculture plantations have implied an imbalance that, in addition to having impacts on human health, also have environmental, social and economic consequences. Environmental imbalance is to be seen in catastrophes such as landslides and alteration to the ecosystem, in detriment to the local fauna and flora. From the socio-economic standpoint it has not been much use either. In fact when the Cryptomeria plantations were ready to be exploited, profitability criteria made the logging industry import wood at lower prices. This has implied a loss of jobs among the rural population linked to the forestry sector, and in turn, promoted rural emigration.

Within this business logic, in spite of possessing enormous volumes of standing trees, Japan is today one of the greatest importers of wood in the world - in the year 2000 it imported 100 million m3 - and has become the major predator of forests in the rest of Asia. In the meanwhile the plantations only seem able to generate allergies. But this is not all. The powerful Japanese industry, a great releaser of carbon dioxide, and therefore responsible for climatic change, is resorting to the new formula of carbon sinks to avoid reducing its releases. And for this purpose it is resorting to the plantation of extensive monoculture tree plantations abroad (see WRM bulletin No. 20). Somehow, it is exporting its own sickness.