is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

Kagawa Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Kagawa Prefecture has a population of 949,358 (as of 2020) and is the smallest prefecture by geographic area at . Kagawa Prefecture borders Ehime Prefecture to the southwest and Tok ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

, with a population of 13,646. The town was established in 2006 and covers various ports and communities on the eastern half of

Shōdoshima Shōdoshima or is an island located in the Seto Inland Sea, Inland Sea of Japan. The name means "Island of Azuki bean, Small Beans". There are two towns on the island: Tonoshō, Kagawa, Tonoshō and Shodoshima, Kagawa, Shōdoshima, composing the ...

, the second-largest island in the

Seto Inland Sea The , sometimes shortened to the Inland Sea, is the body of water separating Honshū, Shikoku, and Kyūshū, three of the four main islands of Japan. It serves as a waterway connecting the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan. It connects to Osaka ...

. Shōdoshima is roughly halfway between the much larger islands of

Shikoku is the smallest of the four main islands of Japan. It is long and between wide. It has a population of 3.8 million (, 3.1%). It is south of Honshu and northeast of Kyushu. Shikoku's ancient names include ''Iyo-no-futana-shima'' (), '' ...

to the south and

Honshu , historically called , is the largest and most populous island of Japan. It is located south of Hokkaidō across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyūshū across the Kanmon Straits. The island separ ...

to the north, and has a mild and relatively dry climate. Soy sauce production, which flourished through the early 20th century, remains a major industry. Other industries include ''

sōmen , ''somyeon'' ( ko, 소면; 素麵), or ''sùmiàn'' () is a very thin noodle made of wheat flour, less than 1.3 mm in diameter. The noodles are used extensively in East Asian cuisines. Japanese ''sōmen'' is made by stretching the dough ...

'' noodles, ''

tsukudani is small seafood, meat or seaweed that has been simmered in soy sauce and mirin. As a flavorful accompaniment to plain rice, tsukudani is made salty enough to not go bad, allowing high osmotic pressure to preserve the ingredients from microbial ...

'' (made with soy sauce), fishing and agriculture. In Japan, olives were first successfully cultivated here in the 1910s and olive oil production resurged in the late 20th century. Tourism is also economically important. Shodoshima participates in the

Setouchi Triennale The Setouchi International Art Triennale is a contemporary art festival held every three years on several islands in the Seto Inland Sea of Japan and the coastal cities of Takamatsu and Tamano is a city located in southern Okayama Prefecture, J ...

, a regional art festival, and the mountainous interior is home to Kankakei Gorge. The book and film ''

Twenty-Four Eyes is a 1954 Japanese drama film directed by Keisuke Kinoshita, based on the 1952 novel of the same name by Sakae Tsuboi. The film stars Hideko Takamine as a schoolteacher named Hisako Ōishi, who lives during the rise and fall of Japanese national ...

'' was set on the island, and a movie studio park and museum attracts visitors.

Geography

Climate

Shōdoshima has a

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...

(

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

''Cfa'') with hot, humid summers, and cool winters. Some rain falls throughout the year, but the months from May to September have the heaviest rain. The average annual temperature in Shōdoshima is . The average annual rainfall is with July as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around , and lowest in January, at around . The highest temperature ever recorded in Shōdoshima was on 21 August 2000; the coldest temperature ever recorded was on 26 February 1981.

Demographics

Per Japanese census data, the population of Shōdoshima in 2020 is 13,870 people. Shōdoshima has been conducting censuses since 1920.

Notable locations

The town of Shōdoshima was created in 2006 by merging the former towns of

Ikeda Ikeda may refer to: * Ikeda (surname), a Japanese surname * Ikeda (comics), a character in ''Usagi Yojimbo'' * Ikeda clan, a Japanese clan * Ikeda map, chaotic attractor * ''Ikeda'' (annelid) a genus of the family Ikedidae Places * Ikeda, Osaka i ...

and Uchinomi, both from Shōzu District. The total area is 95.59 km², and covers the entire eastern half of the island of Shōdoshima. Notable communities and locations include: * Kankakei Gorge * Sakate, a port in the southeast * Kusakabe, a port and community, with soy sauce production concentrated to the east * Olive Park/Olive Garden, olive orchards and tourist sites * Twenty-Four Eyes Movie Studio, a tourist site for the book and film ''Twenty-Four Eyes''

References

External links

* Towns in Kagawa Prefecture {{Kagawa-geo-stub