Kamogawa-shi

In the latest Population Census the population is about 32,000 (32,116 in 2020). This city’s population has a step from a merger. Kamogawa merged with Amatsu-Kominato town in 2005, when the former Kamogawa formed its present municipal area. In 2000, before the merger, it was 29,981 for the former Kamogawa; after the merger, in 2005, it became 36,475 with Amatsu-Kominato town added, and from there it declined gently — 35,766 in 2010, 33,932 in 2015, and 32,116 in 2020.

Looking inside, the figure of a city in the southern Boso Peninsula appears. The share aged 65 and over rose from 26.9% in 2000 to 38.5% in 2020, nearing four in ten. The household-with-children share is low at 14.5% in 2020, and the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.50 in fiscal 2023, a level in the lower-middle for a regional city, covering just about half of expenditure with its own tax revenue. The figure of the birthplace of Nichiren — reducing its population after the merger and deepening its aging, while holding the waitlist at zero — shows in the numbers. Why it took this form cannot be read without going back over the history of the temple town and the sea.

Kamogawa’s skeleton is set by the geography of being a land of Awa opening on the Pacific side of the Boso Peninsula, and by the history of faith and the sea layered upon it. The old layer is faith. In the Kamakura period, Nichiren, who founded the Nichiren sect, is said to have been born in Kominato of this land. On the place of his birth, Kominato-san Tanjo-ji was built, and as a land connected to Nichiren, it has long gathered worshippers. A seaside land took on the weight of faith as the birthplace of the founder of a sect.

The new layer is the sea and medicine. On this town facing the Pacific, in 1970 a facility that shows creatures of the sea — Kamogawa Sea World — was opened, and it became a tourism core representing southern Boso. In addition, a large general hospital stands in this town and has become a hub that bundles together the medicine of the Awa region. Medical functions disproportionate even for a city of thirty-some thousand gather people from the broad sphere of the southern peninsula. A temple town of faith, a seaside tourist spot, and a medical hub at once — this town’s form stands upon the history that the geography of being a land of Awa opening on the Pacific side of the Boso Peninsula has held.

What characterizes Kamogawa-shi is that, while bearing the history of a temple town of faith, a seaside tourist spot, and a medical hub, it reduces its population after the merger and deepens its aging. From 36,475 in 2005, with Amatsu-Kominato town added, to 32,116 in 2020, a little over four thousand were lost in fifteen years. In the southern Boso Peninsula, a land at a distance from the metropolitan area by railway and road, it can be read that, amid a flow of the younger generation moving to cities such as Chiba and Tokyo, the reduction of population and the deepening of aging advance. That the household-with-children share is low at 14.5% in 2020 is also the expression of that population composition.

On the other hand, the Childcare Waitlist has moved at zero, and a Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.50 holds a lower-middle level. The industries particular to this town — tourism and medicine — can be read as supporting tax source and employment to a certain degree. In particular, the function as a medical hub generates employment and a flow of people beyond the scale of a city of thirty-some thousand. The population decreasing, the aging nearing four in ten, the fiscal stamina lower-middle. Looking only at the reduction in the total, it is a shrinking town, but medicine draws people from the sphere, and tourism gathers people on the seashore — shrinkage and a pulling power toward the sphere work in opposite directions within the same town.

Kamogawa, as a land of Awa opening on the Pacific side of the Boso Peninsula, holds several functions of its own. One is its history as a temple town of faith holding Tanjo-ji on the land where Nichiren is said to have been born, with an old layer as the birthplace of the founder of a sect. Another is the facility of sea creatures opened in 1970, keeping its character as a tourism core representing southern Boso. And the large hospital that bundles together the medicine of the Awa region gives this town its own structure as a medical hub beyond the scale of its population.

Kamogawa is an Awa town where a temple town, the sea, and medicine coexist. From the temple town of the birthplace of Nichiren, to a seaside tourist spot, to the medical hub of Awa — the geography of “being a land of Awa opening on the Pacific side of the Boso Peninsula” has called in faith, the sea, and medicine. Because a single monk was born on this seashore, Tanjo-ji was built; because it faces the Pacific, the sea facility was opened; and because medicine was scarce in the broad sphere of the southern peninsula, a large hospital was set here. All three functions were called in, in separate eras, from the single locational advantage of Awa facing the Pacific.