Statistics Bureau of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications 2009

The is the statistical agency of Japan, subordinate to the

Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications The is a Cabinet (government), cabinet-level ministry in the Government of Japan. Its English name was Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications (MPHPT) prior to 2004. It is housed in the 2nd Building of the Centr ...

(MIC). The SBJ have conducted the

Population Census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given population, usually displayed in the form of statistics. This term is used ...

and large-scale surveys to establish key

official statistics Official statistics are statistics published by Government, government agencies or other Statutory corporation, public bodies such as International organization, international organizations as a Public good (economics), public good. They provide q ...

of Japan. It is also in charge of the management of the public online system of official statistics, international cooperation with other countries' statistics offices, and research and publication regarding statistics. Its headquarters is in the ministry's Second Government Office (第2庁舎), in ,

Shinjuku , officially called Shinjuku City, is a special ward of Tokyo, Japan. It is a major commercial and administrative center, housing the northern half of the busiest railway station in the world ( Shinjuku Station) as well as the Tokyo Metropol ...

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

, near

Wakamatsu-kawada Station is a subway station in the central part of Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. Lines *Toei Ōedo Line (E-03) Platforms The station consists of an island platform serving two tracks. Surroundings * Aikikai Hombu Dojo * Statistics Bureau * Ogasawara- ...

of the subway

Toei Ōedo Line The is a rapid transit railway line of the municipal Toei Subway network in Tokyo, Japan. It commenced full operations on December 12, 2000; using the Japanese calendar this reads "12/12/12" as the year 2000 equals Heisei 12. The line is comple ...

. The (NSTAC) and the MIC are in the same building.

Brief history of the SBJ and related organizations

Japan's official statistics system is so "decentralized" that various ministries and agencies have their own statistical departments. The SBJ is the oldest among them. The SBJ's chronological table starts from 1871, when the pre-constitutional Meiji government founded under the system, appointing to its director. After frequent changes in the government organization, was established in 1885 with the Cabinet system starting. In 1920 it was reorganized as to conduct the first , but in 1922 it was re-reorganized to the Statistics Bureau as an agency of the Cabinet. Since then, it has used the name of . Despite some changes in its affiliation, it has kept the identity at least since the 1880s. Among the 54 designated by the government under the (2007 Act No. 53), the SBJ makes 13 through statistical surveys, for example, Population Census, , and . Derived statistics produced from a mixture of existing statistics such as and

Consumer Price Index A consumer price index (CPI) is a statistical estimate of the level of prices of goods and services bought for consumption purposes by households. It is calculated as the weighted average price of a market basket of Goods, consumer goods and ...

as well as register-based statistics of companies and establishments – – are also within the SBJ's coverage. The SBJ thus conducts a number of nation-wide cyclic surveys. However, the SBJ is located in the

capital city A capital city, or just capital, is the municipality holding primary status in a country, state (polity), state, province, department (administrative division), department, or other administrative division, subnational division, usually as its ...

and has no local branch. For nation-wide surveys, each

local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of a higher-level political or administrative unit, such a ...

's statistical division, called , conducts survey work in behalf of the SBJ. This system was started for the first Population Census in 1920 and legally established in 1947 with fiscal backup from the national

budget A budget is a calculation plan, usually but not always financial plan, financial, for a defined accounting period, period, often one year or a month. A budget may include anticipated sales volumes and revenues, resource quantities including tim ...

. Other ministries also use this system to conduct nation-wide surveys, unless they use their own local branch offices.

Organization

The organization of the MIC follows the (2000 No. 246). The following explanations are based on the articles of the Cabinet Order as on April 25, 2024, but English translations are from the information dated September 2021. : The was abolished in 2005. See #MIC Director-General for Policy Planning below.

Statistical Survey Department

Based on the Article 2 of the Cabinet Order, the SBJ has the to conduct the census and surveys. The following divisions have been established under this Department (Articles 110, 115–118). * is in charge of the Population Census, Population Estimates, and other statistical surveys on

demography Demography () is the statistical study of human populations: their size, composition (e.g., ethnic group, age), and how they change through the interplay of fertility (births), mortality (deaths), and migration. Demographic analysis examine ...

workforce In macroeconomics, the workforce or labour force is the sum of people either working (i.e., the employed) or looking for work (i.e., the unemployed): \text = \text + \text Those neither working in the marketplace nor looking for work are out ...

housing Housing refers to a property containing one or more Shelter (building), shelter as a living space. Housing spaces are inhabited either by individuals or a collective group of people. Housing is also referred to as a human need and right to ...

, and

land use Land use is an umbrella term to describe what happens on a parcel of land. It concerns the benefits derived from using the land, and also the land management actions that humans carry out there. The following categories are used for land use: fo ...

. (Article 116) * is in charge of statistical surveys of

companies A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of legal people, whether natural, juridical or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specifi ...

or their

office An office is a space where the employees of an organization perform Business administration, administrative Work (human activity), work in order to support and realize the various goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a po ...

s and

factories A factory, manufacturing plant or production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. Th ...

. (Article 117) * is in charge of statistics on

consumers A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or use purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. Th ...

and

prices A price is the (usually not negative) quantity of payment or compensation expected, required, or given by one party to another in return for goods or services. In some situations, especially when the product is a service rather than a phys ...

including the

. (Article 118) * is in charge of a variety of derived statistics as well as general matters for this Department. (Article 115)

Other divisions

The Articles 110–114 of the Cabinet Order also have provisions about the following divisions under the SBJ. * is in charge of data collection regarding

Statistical Business Register A statistical business register (SBR) plays a central part in a system of official economic statistics at a national statistics office. In comparison, a company register has different purposes: protection, accountability, and control of legal ent ...

. (Article 112) * is in charge of promotion of public use of statistics and

microdata Microdata can mean: * Microdata (statistics), a statistical term for individual response data in surveys and censuses * Microdata (HTML), a specification for semantic markup in HTML * Microdata Corporation Microdata Corporation was an American m ...

publication To publish is to make content available to the general public.Berne Convention, articl ...

and dissemination of knowledge about official statistics, and management of . (Article 113) * is in charge of general matters for the SBJ as well as the management of and . (Article 111) * is in charge of the information systems for the SBJ and for the MIC's Director-General for Policy Planning, including the . (Article 114)

Cooperation within the central statistical system

The SBJ cooperates with other entities in the central government, such as the NSTAC, the Director-General for Policy Planning of the MIC, the , and the Statistical Research and Training Institute, as well as the statistical departments from various ministries.

National Statistics Center

The National Statistics Center (NSTAC) was historically a segment of the SBJ specializing in

tabulation A table is an arrangement of information or data, typically in rows and columns, or possibly in a more complex structure. Tables are widely used in communication, research, and data analysis. Tables appear in print media, handwritten notes, comp ...

. In 1984, this segment was separated from the SBJ to establish the NSTAC. In 2003, it became an

Incorporated Administrative Agency An , or Independent Administrative Institution, is a type of legal corporation formulated by the Government of Japan under the Act on General Rules for Incorporated Administrative Agencies (Act no. 103 of 1999, revised in 2014). The independent age ...

. It processes data for various ministries including the SBJ. The NSTAC and the SBJ also collaborate to develop the Inter-Ministry Information System for Official Statistics, the public online system for statistical surveys and data use. It includes subsystems as follows: * Portal Site of Official Statistics: e-Stat *Portal site for secondary use of microdata: *Online Survey System: e-survey *

The is a new institution run by the SBJ and the NSTAC. It was established in 2018 in

Wakayama Wakayama may refer to: * Wakayama Prefecture, a prefecture of Japan * Wakayama (city), the capital city of Wakayama Prefecture, Japan * Wakayama Station, a train station in Wakayama, Wakayama * Wakayama University, a national university in Wakayama, ...

to offer services of on-site use of microdata, training of statisticians, and consulting about the use of statistics.

MIC Director-General for Policy Planning

The Statistics Act provides that the

Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications The is a member of the Cabinet of Japan and is the leader and chief executive of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. The minister is also a statutory member of the National Security Council (Japan), National Security Council, and ...

has the authority of planning and supervising the whole of the official statistics system, following the advice of the Statistics Commission. The minister delegates these tasks to the Director-General for Policy Planning (not to the SBJ) since 2005. The authority of supervision and planning of the official statistics system derived from the former (1946–1952). Since the abortion of the Commission in 1952, its responsibilities had been taken by the Commissioner of the consulting the, the advisory board with expert statisticians. For this purpose, the Administrative Management Agency included the Statistical Standards Department. The Department inherited the function of the Statistics Commission. As a result of the restructuring of governmental organizations in 1984, the Statistical Standards Department was merged into the SBJ. The Department had thus subordinated to the SBJ from 1984 to 2005. During this period, the government organizations were restructured again in 2001, by which the SBJ moved to the MIC. In 2005, the MIC disestablished the Statistical Standards Department and transferred its functions to one of the of the ministry. This position was initially referred to as in charge of , but since 2021 it has been in charge of . This Director-General of the MIC is also in charge of international communication with statistics offices of other countries, in collaboration with the SBJ.

Statistics Commission

The new Statistics Commission was established by the full amendment of the Statistics Act in 2007. It is a council handling the official statistics system, made up from 13 or fewer academic experts. It was a substitute for the Statistics Council, but was provided a broader authority. The revision of the Statistics Act in 2018 further extended the Commission's authority to control the whole of the official statistics. It manages , reviews the plan and process of each of fundamental statistics, maintains statistical standards such as , and supervises the anonymization of micro data for secondary use of statistics.

Inter-ministry activities

The statistical departments from various ministries, including the SBJ, hold to discuss issues on official statistics. During 2001–2007, when the Statistics Council lost the authority to actively offer its opinion to the government as a result of the

2001 Central Government Reform The by the Japanese government involved the establishment of a new ministry, the merging of existing ministries and the abolition of others. This resulted in little more than a change of ministry names (with the exception of the Environment Agen ...

, these inter-ministry conferences were the substantial opportunity for decisions on technical matters regarding the statistics system.

Statistical Research and Training Institute

The is located in Kokubunji in the west of

Tokyo Prefecture Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital and most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is one of the most populous urban areas in the world. The Greater Tokyo Area, which ...

. It has its root in the established in 1921. It became an independent educational institute of the MIC in 2003 and included the function of research that had been performed by the SBJ in 2017. The institute has thus conducted research of statistical technologies as well as training of statisticians. The SBJ is in charge of affairs related to the Institute.

Library and museum

The Statistical Library is officially a branch of the

National Diet Library The is the national library of Japan and among the largest libraries in the world. It was established in 1948 for the purpose of assisting members of the in researching matters of public policy. The library is similar in purpose and scope to ...

. It holds collections related to statistics as well as unpublished tables on

microfilm A microform is a scaled-down reproduction of a document, typically either photographic film or paper, made for the purposes of transmission, storage, reading, and printing. Microform images are commonly reduced to about 4% or of the original d ...

. The Statistical Library also offers a reference service on the use of statistics of Japan. The SBJ is in charge of the management of the library. The SBJ also runs the . This museum holds historical materials regarding Japan's official statistics.

Publication

The SBJ compiles statistical

yearbook A yearbook, also known as an annual, is a type of Annual publication, a book published annually. One use is to record, highlight, and commemorate the past year of a school. The term also refers to a book of statistics or facts published annually ...

s such as , ''Statistical Handbook of Japan'', and , as well as reports of the censuses and surveys the SBJ conducted. It has also edited books on the SBJ's history and

historical document Historical documents are original documents that contain important historical information about a person, place, or event and can thus serve as primary sources as important ingredients of the historical methodology. Significant historical docume ...

s related to official statistics. (in 6 volumes)

Explanatory notes

References

External links

Statistics Bureau of Japan

Statistics Bureau of Japan
{{Authority control Government agencies of Japan

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 ...