Yame-shi

In the latest Population Census the population is about 61,000 (60,608 in 2020). Because this city incorporated surrounding towns and villages twice, in 2006 and 2010, the population step in the city area appears between 2005 and 2010, when the larger, second merger is reflected in the census. The population seen in the pre-incorporation city area was 38,951 in 2005, 69,057 in 2010 once it became a broad city area including the mountains and valleys of tea, 64,408 in 2015, and 60,608 in 2020 — it has fallen.

Looking inside, the figure of a rural merchant city that produces tea and Buddhist altars appears. The share aged 65 and over rose from 33.3% in 2015 to 36.4% in 2020, well over three in ten. The household-with-children share is 20.6% (2020), and the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.38 in fiscal 2023 — its own tax revenue does not reach four-tenths of expenditure, a level with a large degree of reliance on the local allocation tax. A city of tea and Buddhist altars loses population and advances its aging within a broad city area after two mergers. To unravel how this came about, one needs to go back over the history of tea, merchants and two mergers.

This town’s skeleton is set by the climate of a tea land that produces gyokuro, a rural merchant town without a castle, the handiwork of Buddhist altars and washi that took root there, and two mergers. The starting layer is a merchant town. This land was not a castle town but a rural merchant town that opened as the commercial land at the center of Yame County. The merchant townscape formed in the Edo era still remains along a single street, and has been chosen as an Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings. A merchant town without a castle was the old center of this town.

In this merchant town, tea and handiwork took root. This land is known as a land that produces tea, gyokuro foremost; around the Kaei era (about 1850) the making of Buddhist altars was established as a local industry, and is now a nationally designated traditional craft. The hand-dipping of washi paper and the pasting of lanterns have also been carried on. The path to becoming a city also reflects this town. In 2006 it incorporated a neighboring town, and in 2010 four towns and villages including the mountains and valleys of tea, and the city area widened greatly. The tea land that produces gyokuro, the rural merchant town, the handiwork of Buddhist altars and washi, and two mergers. The history of tea and handiwork, held by a merchant town without a castle, has formed the present shape of the town.

What characterizes Yame is that, while it holds the history of a rural merchant town and tea and handiwork, it has been losing population within a broad city area after two mergers. The 38,951 of 2005 seen in the pre-incorporation city area became 69,057 in 2010 in the city area combining four towns and villages including the mountains and valleys of tea, after which it fell to 60,608 in 2020 — some eight thousand lost over ten years. Even in this land that produces tea, joins Buddhist altars and dips washi, in the mountainside former towns and villages especially, part of the young generation moved toward larger cities or toward Fukuoka and Kurume, and one can read that the age of the town as a whole rose. That the share aged 65 and over was well over three in ten at 36.4% in 2020 is an expression of that.

On the other hand, the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025, and the household-with-children share is 20.6% (2020). The Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.38 is a level whose own tax revenue does not reach four-tenths of expenditure, showing the large degree of reliance on the local allocation tax seen commonly in lands chiefly of tea and handiwork. The population declined after the merger, the aging passes the mid-three-tenths, and the fiscal stamina is not thick by tax revenue alone. These are things that proceeded in overlap upon the history of tea and merchants, and by pulling out any single indicator alone, the outline of this town cannot be drawn.

In Yame, several functions of differing histories are folded together. One is the old layer of a rural merchant town, which opened not as a castle town but as the commercial land at the center of Yame County, keeping an Edo-era merchant townscape along a single street. Another is its character as a land of handiwork: a tea land that produces gyokuro, which has carried on the joining of Buddhist altars, the dipping of washi and the pasting of lanterns. The flatland of southern Fukuoka Prefecture, and the landform of the mountains and valleys of tea ranging behind it, drew the commercial town, and then handiwork, into this land.

The flatland of southern Fukuoka Prefecture and the mountains and valleys of tea behind it — under this landform, a commercial town stood and handiwork grew, and the framework of the town came into being. Precisely because it did not hold a castle, a base of governance, this town sought a way forward in commerce and handiwork. That there was no castle, on the contrary, took the peculiar handiwork of tea, Buddhist altars and washi and rooted it deep in this land.