There is a city where the scenery appears to float upon the sea. From a fishing town on that same Toyama Bay, in one year a voice rising against the price of rice spread across the nation. The city of the mirage and the rice riots has gently lost population over twenty years. Uozu-shi’s numbers are the record of a fishing-port town inscribed with the wonders of Toyama Bay and the year 1918.
A city in the eastern part of Toyama Prefecture, opening onto flat land facing Toyama Bay. The population has gently fallen over twenty years, from 47,136 in 2000 to 40,535 in 2020. What I (Atlas) want to read here is not the sign “the city of the mirage,” but the causal thread: how the history — the wonders of Toyama Bay, the rice riots, and the fishing port — is translated into today’s population and finances.
01 · See the present Uozu-shi in its numbers
In the 2020 Population Census the population is 40,535. This city’s population is not a step from a great merger; it has gently lost more than six thousand over twenty years, from 47,136 in 2000 through 46,331 in 2005, 44,959 in 2010, and 42,935 in 2015 to 40,535 in 2020. It is the curve of a city facing Toyama Bay contracting gently.
Looking inside the figures, the figure of a fishing-port town of Toyama Bay appears. The share aged 65 and over rose from 21.5% in 2000 to 34.3% in 2020, passing three in ten. Households with children make up 18.8% (2020), and the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.67 in fiscal 2023 — a level whose own tax revenue covers about two-thirds of expenditure, which is on the higher side for a regional city. The numbers show the city of the mirage and the rice riots, while losing population and deepening in age, keeping its fiscal stamina on the higher side. Why it takes this shape cannot be read without going back over the wonders of Toyama Bay and the history of 1918.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Local Government Finance Survey, Fiscal Capacity Index (MIC) / Childcare Facility Status Report (Children and Families Agency) / Real Estate Information Library (MLIT)
02 · The three great wonders of Toyama Bay, the rice riots, the fishing port — the history behind the numbers
What makes Uozu up is the geography of facing Toyama Bay, and the natural wonders and historical events that bay brings. One layer is the nature of Toyama Bay. In this city three rare phenomena are seen: the mirage, in which in early spring the scenery upon the sea appears to float and shimmer; the firefly squid that throng to Toyama Bay; and the buried forest that emerges from underground. Locally these are called the “three great wonders.” The condition of the distinctive geography of Toyama Bay gathered into this city natural phenomena seen in no other land.
The other layer is a historical event. In 1918, amid a surge in the price of rice, the women of this fishing town of Uozu raised a movement against the shipping-out of rice. This became one of the starting points of the rice riots that spread across the nation, and Uozu was inscribed in history as the “birthplace of the rice riots.” The living of a fishing town that made Toyama Bay its place of livelihood became the starting point of a voice rising against the price of rice. Toyama Bay gives birth to wonders, and the fishing town facing that bay raises the voice of the rice riots — the history of nature and events that the geography of facing Toyama Bay carried shapes today’s Uozu.
Source: Uozu, the Three Wonders (mirage / firefly squid / buried forest — Uozu City official tourism guide) / Birthplace of the Rice Riots (1918 — Uozu City official tourism guide)
03 · People fall, and the thickness of the tax source remains
What characterizes Uozu-shi is that, while holding the wonders of Toyama Bay and the fishing port, it has gently lost population over twenty years. From 2000 to 2020 more than six thousand were lost, and the share aged 65 and over rose to 34.3%. In a city based on the fisheries of Toyama Bay and local industry, amid a flow of the younger generation moving to cities such as Toyama City and the metropolitan area, the decline of population and the deepening of aging can be read as advancing.
On the other hand, fiscal stamina holds on the higher side. A Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.67 is a level whose own tax revenue covers about two-thirds of expenditure, which is on the higher side for a regional city. The fisheries of Toyama Bay and the local industry of the eastern part of Toyama Prefecture can be read as still giving a certain thickness to the tax source. The Childcare Waitlist too was zero in both 2024 and 2025, and the capacity for childcare against the fallen population is kept. Population falls, aging passes three in ten, and yet fiscal stamina stays on the higher side — that the curve of population and the stamina of finances do not move in the same direction is the figure of Uozu, the city of Toyama Bay, in its numbers. Watch only the falling population and the thickness of this city’s tax source is mismeasured.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Local Government Finance Survey, Fiscal Capacity Index (MIC) / Childcare Facility Status Report (Children and Families Agency)
04 · The wonders geography gave birth to, and the riot people raised
Uozu holds several functions of its own. One is the three great wonders of Toyama Bay — the mirage, the firefly squid, and the buried forest — holding the origin of a place where natural phenomena seen in no other land gather. Another is the history of being the birthplace of the rice riots of 1918, keeping the memory of a fishing town’s living becoming the starting point of a historical event. And the geography of a fishing port facing Toyama Bay gives this land a structure of its own, as a town that makes the bay its place of livelihood.
Uozu is a fishing port inscribed with the wonders of Toyama Bay and the year 1918. From a city where the three great wonders are seen to the birthplace of the rice riots — the geography of “being flat land facing Toyama Bay” called forth natural wonders and a fishing port, and that fishing town raised the voice of the rice riots. The mirage the sea floats is a prank of geography; the voice that resisted the shipping-out of rice was the will of people. Two events of wholly different natures have left their names on a single shore, Toyama Bay.
Source: Uozu, the Three Wonders (mirage / firefly squid / buried forest — Uozu City official tourism guide) / Birthplace of the Rice Riots (1918 — Uozu City official tourism guide)
05 · Atlas note — population and tax source in a city where scenery floats upon the sea
Lay out Uozu’s numbers and the indicators of a fishing-port town of Toyama Bay contracting gently line up: a population fallen over twenty years, an aging rate of 34.3%, a household-with-children share of 18.8%, fiscal capacity of 0.67. Because as a certified public accountant I (Atlas) have the habit of reckoning population and tax source separately, what draws the eye here is that, while gently losing population and deepening in age, the Fiscal Capacity Index stays on the higher side for a regional city at 0.67. Even as the population shrinks, the fisheries of Toyama Bay and the local industry of the eastern part of Toyama Prefecture give thickness to the tax source, and its own tax revenue covers about two-thirds of expenditure. The decline of population and the stamina of finances do not necessarily move in the same direction — that example can be seen in these numbers.
One more thing to weigh is that this city is known by two histories of differing natures: “natural wonders” and “a historical event.” The mirage and the firefly squid are natural phenomena that the geography of Toyama Bay brings; the rice riots are a historical event that the living of a fishing town raised. What geography gave birth to and what people raised stand side by side as the memory of the same city. On a spring morning, the townscape appears to float and shimmer upon Toyama Bay — and on that same shore, the population has quietly thinned over twenty years, and yet the thickness of the tax source has remained. Like the mirage on the sea, the two lines of the people’s decline and the city’s stamina do not overlap; they shimmer separately. Whether one gazes at that gap as the air of a fishing port, or measures it as the ground strength of a living, the Uozu one sees changes.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Uozu, the Three Wonders (mirage / firefly squid / buried forest — Uozu City official tourism guide) / Birthplace of the Rice Riots (1918 — Uozu City official tourism guide)
Editor’s note: all figures and sources are drawn from official statistics. The prose follows Atlas’s voice, and AI (atlas-handcrafted-reverse-v1 (Daiki 2026-06-02)) handled the shaping of the text. Evaluative or predictive language (such as “a good buy” or “attractive”) is intentionally left out. Revision id: wave11a_