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 ...

located in

Iwate Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. It is the second-largest Japanese prefecture at , with a population of 1,210,534 (as of October 1, 2020). Iwate Prefecture borders Aomori Prefecture to the north, Akita Prefectur ...

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 ...

. , the town had an estimated

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a ...

of 5,315, and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopul ...

of 16 persons per km² in 2142 households. The total area of the town is .

Geography

Sumita is located in a basin in southeastern Iwate Prefecture in the southern

Kitakami Mountains is a mountain range in northeastern Honshu, in the Tōhoku region of northern Japan.Kitakami Mou ...

, surrounded by peaks with an elevation of between 600 and 1500 meters an all sides. Approximately 90% of the town’s area is covered by forest and mountains.

Neighboring municipalities

Iwate Prefecture * Ōfunato *

Rikuzentakata is a city located in Iwate Prefecture, Japan. In the census of 2010, the city had a population of 23,302 (2005: 24,709), and a population density of 100 persons per km². The 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami caused extensive damage to the c ...

Ichinoseki is a city located in Iwate Prefecture, in the Tōhoku region of northern Japan. , the city had a population of 114,476 and a population density of 91 persons per km² in 46,375 households. It is currently the second largest city by population in ...

* Tōno *

Kamaishi is a city located on the Sanriku rias coast in Iwate Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 32,609, and a population density of 74 persons per km2, in 16,230 households. The total area of the city is Geography Kamaishi ...

Ōshū Oshu or Ōshū may refer to: *Another name for Mutsu Province, a former Japanese province *Ōshū, Iwate, Japan, a city *Northern Fujiwara The Northern Fujiwara (奥州藤原氏 ''Ōshū Fujiwara-shi'') were a Japanese kuge, noble Japanese c ...

Climate

Sumita has a humid climate (

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 ...

''Dfa'') with warm summers and cold winters. The average annual temperature in Sumita is 10.4 °C. The average annual rainfall is 1379 mm with September as the wettest month and January as the driest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around 23.1 °C, and lowest in January, at around -1.2 °C.

Demographics

Per Japanese census data,Sumita population statistics
/ref> the population of Sumita peaked in the 1950s and has declined over the past 60 years. It is now much less than it was a century ago.

History

The area of present-day Sumita was part of ancient

Mutsu Province was an old province of Japan in the area of Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate and Aomori Prefectures and the municipalities of Kazuno and Kosaka in Akita Prefecture. Mutsu Province is also known as or . The term is often used to refer to the comb ...

. It was under the control of the

Date clan The is a Japanese samurai kin group. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003)"Date", ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 5 retrieved 2013-5-5. History The Date family was founded ...

during the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

, who ruled the

Sendai Domain The , also known as the , was a domain of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan during the Edo period from 1600 to 1871. The Sendai Domain was based at Aoba Castle in Mutsu Province, in the modern city of Sendai, located in the Tōhoku region of the i ...

under the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...

. The villages of Kamiarisu, Shimoarisu and Setamai within Kesen District were created on April 1, 1889, with the establishment of the modern municipalities system. Setamai became a town on April 29, 1940. Kamiarisu and Shimoarisu merged with Setamai on April 1, 1955 to create the town of Sumita.

Government

Sumita has a mayor-council form of government with a directly elected mayor and a

unicameral Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multic ...

town council of 12 members. Sumita, together with the city of

contributes one seat to the Iwate Prefectural legislature. In terms of national politics, the town is part of

Iwate 2nd district Iwate 2nd district is a single-member constituency of the House of Representatives in the National Diet of Japan. It is located on the island of Honshu, in Iwate Prefecture, and includes the cities of Kuji, Miyako, and Rikuzentakata, among others. ...

of the

lower house A lower house is one of two Debate chamber, chambers of a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, the other chamber being the upper house. Despite its official position "below" the upper house, in many legislatures worldwide, the lower house has co ...

of the

Diet of Japan The is the national legislature of Japan. It is composed of a lower house, called the House of Representatives (, ''Shūgiin''), and an upper house, the House of Councillors (, '' Sangiin''). Both houses are directly elected under a paralle ...

Economy

The local economy consists largely of forestry and agriculture, with

pig farming Pig farming or pork farming or hog farming is the raising and breeding of domestic pigs as livestock, and is a branch of animal husbandry. Pigs are farmed principally for food (e.g. pork: bacon, ham, gammon) and skins. Pigs are amenable t ...

contributing to over half of the town's agricultural production.

Education

Sumita has two public elementary schools and two public middle schools operated by the local board of education. There is one public high school operated by the Iwate Prefectural Board of Education.

Transportation

Railway

East Japan Railway Company The is a major passenger railway company in Japan and is the largest of the seven Japan Railways Group companies. The company name is officially abbreviated as JR-EAST or JR East in English, and as in Japanese. The company's headquarters are ...

(JR East) -

Kamaishi Line The is a rural railway line in Iwate Prefecture, Japan, operated by the East Japan Railway Company (JR East). It connects Hanamaki Station in the city of Hanamaki with Kamaishi Station in the city of Kamaishi. History The precursor to the li ...