CityLab Daily: A Japanese Mayor Is Successfully Boosting Birth Rates
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The Tokyo suburb of Nagareyama, where the city has gained prominence in Japan as one of the few areas with a rising birth rate and population.
Photographer: Kosuke Okahara/Bloomberg
From posting photos of himself weight-training on Instagram to completing a postgraduate degree in the US, Yoshiharu Izaki, the 70-year-old mayor of the Tokyo suburb of Nagareyama, stands out in many ways.
But Izaki’s greatest feat has been implementing child-care initiatives that have made the town one of the few areas in Japan with a rising birth rate and population. Since Izaki assumed the post in 2003, Nagareyama’s fertility rate has surpassed the national level and its rate of population growth has been the highest in the nation for six consecutive years.
In the latest in a series of conversations with mayors, Izaki spoke with reporter Mia Glass about how his child-care policies came about and his vision for Nagareyama’s future. Today on CityLab: The Mayor Helping to Boost Birth Rates in Japan