270px, Minamitane Town Office
is a
town
A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city.
The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...
located on the island of
Tanegashima, in
Kumage District,
Kagoshima Prefecture,
Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
. , the town had an estimated
population
Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...
of 5,249 in 2893 households, and a
population density
Population density (in agriculture: Standing stock (disambiguation), 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 geog ...
of 48 persons per km
2.
The total area of the town is . The main
spaceport
A spaceport or cosmodrome is a site for launching or receiving spacecraft, by analogy to a seaport for ships or an airport for aircraft. The word ''spaceport''—and even more so ''cosmodrome''—has traditionally referred to sites capable of ...
of the
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
The is the Japanese national Aeronautics, air and space agency. Through the merger of three previously independent organizations, JAXA was formed on 1 October 2003. JAXA is responsible for research, technology development and launch of satell ...
is located at the
Tanegashima Space Center in Minamitane.
Geography
Minamitane is located on the southern end of the island of
Tanegashima, bordered by the
East China Sea to the west and the
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
to the east, and the town of
Nakatane to the north.
Climate
The climate is classified as
humid subtropical (
Köppen climate classification
The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...
''Cfa'') with very warm summers and mild winters. Precipitation is high throughout the year, but is highest in the months of May, June and September. The area is subject to frequent
typhoon
A typhoon is a tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere and which produces sustained hurricane-force winds of at least . This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, accounting for a ...
s.
Demographics
Per Japanese census data, the population of Minamitane is as shown below:
History
The area of Minamitane was part of ancient
Ōsumi Province. During the
Edo Period
The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...
, the area was part of the holdings of
Satsuma Domain. Minamitane Village was established on April 1, 1889. In 1879, a government office (役場) was established in the village of Shimama (島間村), also overseeing the villages of Nishino (西之村) and Sakai (坂井村), while another government office was established in Kukinaga (茎永村), also covering the villages of Hirayama (平山村) and Nakano (中之村). These former villages were then merged to form Minamitane Village. Minamitane was upgraded to town status on October 15, 1956.
Government
Minamitane 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 consisting of one house or assembly that legislates and votes as one. Unicameralism has become an increasingly common type of legislature, making up nearly ...
town council of 10 members. Minamitane, collectively with the other municipalities of Kumage District and the city of
Nishinoomote, contributes two members to the Kagoshima Prefectural Assembly. In terms of national politics, the town is part of the
Kagoshima 4th district of the
lower house
A lower house is the lower chamber of a bicameral legislature, where the other chamber is the upper house. Although styled as "below" the upper house, in many legislatures worldwide, the lower house has come to wield more power or otherwise e ...
of the
Diet of Japan
, transcription_name = ''Kokkai''
, legislature = 215th Session of the National Diet
, coa_pic = Flag of Japan.svg
, house_type = Bicameral
, houses =
, foundation=29 November 1890(), leader1_type ...
.
Economy
The economy of Minamitane is based largely on agriculture and commercial fishing.
Education
Minamitane has eight public elementary high schools and one public junior high school operated by the town government. The town does not have a high school.
Transportation
Highways
*
Notable people
The
Mangjeol family of
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...
trace their ancestry to a man from Shimama Village surnamed Amikiri (網切) who went to
Korea
Korea is a peninsular region in East Asia consisting of the Korean Peninsula, Jeju Island, and smaller islands. Since the end of World War II in 1945, it has been politically Division of Korea, divided at or near the 38th parallel north, 3 ...
during the
colonial period and settled there. His son married a Korean woman, and his grandson Amikiri Ichirō (網切一郎) chose to remain in South Korea after
its independence and naturalised as a
South Korean citizen, and changed his name to the
Korean reading of its characters, Mangjeol Ilrang.
References
External links
*
*
{{Authority control
Towns in Kagoshima Prefecture
Populated coastal places in Japan