Chino-shi

In the most recent Population Census the population is about 56,000 (56,400 in 2020). From 54,841 in 2000, through 57,099 in 2005, 56,391 in 2010 and 55,912 in 2015, it reached 56,400 in 2020 — holding around fifty-six thousand throughout twenty years. While many cities of northern Shinano and the Ina valley reduce their populations, holding nearly level is rather rare for an inland city.

Look into the makeup and the figure of a city that layered many livelihoods onto a Jomon plateau appears. The share aged 65 and over rose from 18.2% in 2000 to 30.2% in 2020 — up about twelve points over twenty years, past three in ten. Households with children were 21.3% in 2020. The childcare waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.54 in FY2023 — a middling level for an inland city, where its own tax revenue covers a little over half of expenditure. The numbers show a plateau city that began with a Jomon kingdom and layered agar and precision machinery, holding its population nearly level while raising the town’s age. Why it takes this shape cannot be read without going back to the history of the kingdom, agar and industry.

This town’s skeleton is set in many layers — by a five-thousand-year-old Jomon kingdom as its oldest stratum, by the food handicraft the harsh winter raised, and by precision machinery that followed on from silk-reeling. The oldest stratum is the Jomon. This plateau at the western foot of Yatsugatake was, in the middle Jomon period about five thousand years ago, one of Japan’s foremost kingdoms. The Jomon sites within the city are beyond counting; one was designated a Special Historic Site early on, and the clay figurines unearthed at two of the sites were each later designated National Treasures. The distant prosperity of the Jomon is this plateau’s deepest foundation.

Upon that, the livelihoods of the early modern and modern eras were laid in many layers. The harsh winter cold and dry climate raised the food handicraft of agar and freeze-dried tofu, which make use of cold and dryness. The technique of agar-making was transmitted from the Kansai region in the Edo era. Further, in the modern era, the silk-reeling that prospered in the Suwa region went on, in time, to the industry of making precision machinery. And the highland on the slopes of Yatsugatake also gathered people as a place of resort and tourism. A five-thousand-year Jomon kingdom, the food handicraft of agar and freeze-dried tofu, the industry of precision machinery following on from silk-reeling, and a highland resort — this town’s shape stands on a history that layered the livelihoods of food, industry and tourism, in many layers, onto a Jomon-kingdom plateau.

What characterizes Chino is that, while carrying the old history of a Jomon kingdom, it has held its population nearly level throughout twenty years. From 54,841 in 2000 to 56,400 in 2020, the population, far from declining, rose slightly, moving level at around fifty-six thousand. While many cities of northern Shinano and the Ina valley reduced their populations by ten or twenty percent over twenty years, that it could hold nearly level can be read as because this plateau, rather than leaning on one livelihood, layered livelihoods of differing character in many layers — the food handicraft, the industry of precision machinery, and highland tourism. A stance in which another pillar supports when one pillar thins has held back the outflow of people.

But within that level line, the town’s age has steadily risen. The share aged 65 and over was 30.2% in 2020, past three in ten, up about twelve points over twenty years. Households with children were 21.3% in 2020, and the childcare waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. A Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.54 is a middling level where its own tax revenue covers a little over half of expenditure; it can be read that, holding the industry of precision machinery, it has a thicker tax base than is usual for an inland city. The plateau city layered with many livelihoods now holds its population nearly level while raising the town’s age. The population is nearly flat, aging is past three in ten, and fiscal stamina is middling. The same climate of cold and dryness supported the Jomon prosperity of five thousand years ago, raised the handicraft of agar, and called in the industry of precision — and the numbers say it is owing to that layering that Chino has not declined.

Chino’s history is not one thing. It has the oldest history, in which the plateau at the western foot of Yatsugatake was one of Japan’s foremost kingdoms in the middle Jomon period five thousand years ago and produced two National Treasure clay figurines. It has the character by which the harsh winter cold and dry climate raised the food handicraft of agar and freeze-dried tofu. And it layers the modern livelihoods of precision machinery following on from silk-reeling and a highland resort on the slopes of Yatsugatake. The plateau at the western foot of Yatsugatake, and its cold, dry climate, layered everything from Jomon prosperity to the food handicraft, industry and tourism onto one plateau.

Chino is a town where a Jomon-kingdom plateau layered food, industry and tourism in many strata. From a five-thousand-year Jomon kingdom, to agar and freeze-dried tofu, to silk-reeling and then precision machinery, to a highland resort — the cold, dry plateau at the western foot of Yatsugatake drew the distant prosperity of the Jomon, the food handicraft that makes use of the cold, and modern industry and tourism onto a single plateau. The winter five thousand years ago that produced the National Treasure clay figurines, and the winter that now dries the agar bars, are the same cold and dryness. That unchanging climate has, through five thousand years, kept this plateau laying down livelihoods.