Hokkaido, Spring 2007: Wind and Earth Supported by Co-financing -- Construction Industry's Entry into Agriculture and the Rise of Wind Power Generation

Hokkaido, Spring 2007: Wind and Earth Supported by Co-financing -- Construction Industry's Entry into Agriculture and the Rise of Wind Power Generation

In the spring of 2007, signs of change were spreading across the vast land of Hokkaido. The Koizumi administration's wave of structural reforms was rapidly shrinking local public works projects, and Hokkaido's construction industry in particular was facing a serious decline in orders. With national and local governments cutting back on infrastructure investment, civil engineering firms were forced to idle their heavy equipment and human resources, and the local economy was becoming increasingly stagnant.

Meanwhile, in rural areas, the number of bearers was declining due to the aging of the population, and farmland was falling into disrepair. At the intersection of these two issues, a new industrial intersection was born. A construction company began contracting out agricultural work. In response to the need for heavy machinery to rehabilitate abandoned farmland and the lack of manpower among elderly farmers, construction companies are taking charge of agricultural infrastructure such as clearing, ridging, and irrigation channel maintenance, and during the busy season they even provide support for harvesting and shipping. As a result, agriculture has begun to merge with "outsourced" professions.

This change was not just a "change of business type," but also a movement to re-edit the labor and land resources of the region. In addition, interest in renewable energy increased that year, and construction of one of the largest wind farms in Japan began in Hokkaido, with co-financing from regional banks and credit unions. Construction companies were again instrumental in laying the foundations and power transmission facilities for the project. Rather than being a substitute for public utilities, they are being restored as the next generation of public infrastructure providers.

At the time, Japan was approaching the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, and CO₂ reduction was becoming a national policy. Global warming countermeasures, agricultural revitalization, and the sustainability of local economies - all of these were quietly linked together in Hokkaido. Wind power generation, made possible through co-financing, and construction technology with its roots in agriculture. This fusion of wind and earth power was a still-unnamed original landscape of 21st century regional development.