The Review of Korean Studies
- P-ISSN1229-0076
- E-ISSN2773-9351
- SCOPUS, ESCI
ISSN : 1229-0076
Reclamation Projects and Development of Agricultural Land in Colonial Korea
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to collect data from articles on reclamation projects from the Official Gazette of the Japanese Government-General of Korea to estimate long-term statistics and to analyze the development of reclamation projects and business entities during Korea’s colonial period. With regard to the natural environment of the Korean peninsula, tidal flats favorable for reclamation projects are spread on both the west and south coasts. Unlike other land improvement projects, reclamation projects require substantial technology and long-term fixed capital investment. Issuance of reclamation licenses increased rapidly in the late 1910s and early 1920s due to the increase in rice and farmland prices. On the other hand, reclamation completion, which signifies the success of a reclamation project, increased greatly from the latter half of the 1920s to the early 1930s. Not only did the annual completion area increase, but so did the average scale of a project, reaching an average of more than 100 ha per project. The agricultural area developed by reclamation projects in colonial Korea reached a total of about 56,000 ha, supporting a stable food supply within the Japanese Empire and the formation of a colonial landlord system. In other words, quality agricultural land was developed through relatively low-cost projects, and the additional rice produced by this expansion of agricultural land was exported to Japan. Even though the goal of the reclamation projects was to distribute food within the Japanese Empire and stabilize Japanese immigration, it was more about increasing business profit given the opportunity cost of the reclamation projects in the Japanese Empire.
- keywords
- reclamation, rice production, agricultural land, colonial Korea, Japanese Government-General of Korea
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