人口下降導致日本廢棄土地激增

The scenario was a landowner’s dream. A new trunk road was coming to Greater Tokyo and a small patch of scrubby grass, good for nothing much else, lay directly in its path. A bit of gumption, an able lawyer and Japan’s transport ministry would have to pay up.

這樣的情景曾是一個土地所有者夢寐以求的。一條正在修建的通往大東京地區(qū)的干道，一小塊沒有其它大用、灌木叢生的草地正好處于干道的必經(jīng)之路上。只需一些勇氣，外加一位能干的律師，日本國土交通省就不得不支付征地補償。

In fact, says Uichiro Masumoto of the ministry’s land and construction bureau, a stubborn landowner would have been great news. The reality was much worse: there was no landowner. The plot in question was last registered in 1904 to a woman born sometime in the reign of the Meiji emperor.

日本國土交通省土地建設產(chǎn)業(yè)局的正本一郎(Uichiro Masumoto)說，事實上，有一個頑固的土地所有者反而好一些。現(xiàn)實情況要糟得多：根本找不到土地所有者。上面說的那塊土地最后的登記時間是1904年，所有人是一位出生于明治天皇時期的女性。

Bureaucrats burrowed into archives. They ultimately came out with 148 heirs — which was only the start of their difficulties, because eight of them had emigrated. Almost 200 letters and interviews later, the government gave up. A court order let the road go ahead. The process took three years.

官員們鉆進歷史檔案中尋找。他們最終找到了148位繼承人——這只是麻煩的開始，因為其中有八人已經(jīng)移民國外了。后來在發(fā)出了近200封信函并進行了多次走訪后，政府放棄了。一家法院裁決道路施工繼續(xù)向前推進。整個過程耗費了三年的時間。

Masumoto’s roadblock is just one manifestation of a growing problem in ageing, urbanised Japan. Land that was once a feudal treasure, and is still protected by unshakeable property rights, is now so worthless that its owners are running away.

正本遇到的修路障礙，只是人口老齡化和城市化的日本面臨的一個日益嚴重的問題的縮影。土地曾經(jīng)是封建財富，今天仍受到不可動搖的財產(chǎn)權的保護，但現(xiàn)在有些土地卻變得一錢不值，所有者棄之而去。

More than 20 per cent of Japan, an area the size of Denmark, has no readily contactable owner. By 2040 the projected area is bigger than the Republic of Ireland — a spreading nightmare for government, construction and the property industry, because if nobody knows who owns the land then nobody, except for flytippers, can use it.

逾20%的日本土地，相當于丹麥的國土面積，沒有可以立即聯(lián)絡到的所有人。預計到2020年，這類土地的面積將超過愛爾蘭的國土面積——對于政府以及建筑和地產(chǎn)行業(yè)而言，這是一個不斷蔓延的噩夢，因為，如果沒人知道土地的所有人是誰，那么除了亂倒垃圾的人以外，誰都無法使用它。

Forestry roads go unmaintained, solar farms are left unbuilt and taxes uncollected. According to a private sector working group on unowned land, by 2040 the annual economic cost will rise from ¥180bn ($1.6bn) to ¥310bn.

森林中的道路無人維護，太陽能發(fā)電廠成為爛尾項目，財產(chǎn)稅收不上來。根據(jù)一民間無主土地工作小組統(tǒng)計的數(shù)據(jù)，到2040年，由此造成的經(jīng)濟成本將從每年1800億日元(合16億美元)上升到3100億日元。

“Up until now, as the population boomed on these cramped islands, every bit of land was precious,” says Hiroya Masuda, chairman of the working group and a former governor of Iwate prefecture. “But with the population in decline there’s more and more land with no chance of using it.”

“過去，隨著日本人口在這些面積狹小的島嶼上不斷膨脹，每一塊土地都很珍貴，”上述工作小組的負責人、曾任巖手縣知事的增田寬也(Hiroya Masuda)說，“隨著人口減少，越來越多的土地沒有了使用的機會。”

Japan’s population fell by 403,000 in 2017. On current trends it will drop from 126.5m to 88m by 2065 and just 51m by 2115. The decline is fastest in rural areas, with northern prefectures such as Aomori, Akita and Iwate losing about 1 per cent of their people every year.

日本人口在2017年減少了40.3萬。按照目前的趨勢發(fā)展下去，到2065年總人口將從1.265億降至8800萬，到2115年僅剩下5100萬。農(nóng)村地區(qū)的降速最快，青森、秋田和巖手等北部縣份的人口每年減少約1%。

Ownerless land was a big issue after the 2011 tsunami, says Masuda, as Iwate tried to find space for temporary homes. He cites his own experience of trying to build a prefectural road only to find an heir had migrated to Brazil in the 1950s. The Japanese embassy in Brasília drew a blank in its search. “In the end, we gave up and shifted the road,” he says.

增田說，2011年海嘯過后，無主土地成了一個大問題，當時巖手縣試圖尋找土地搭建臨時住所。他講述了自己的一次親身經(jīng)歷。當年巖手縣要修建一條公路，但前提是必須找到一個在二十世紀五十年代移民到巴西的土地繼承人。日本駐巴西大使館多方搜尋無果。他說：“我們最終放棄了，公路改道。”

Small fields in isolated valleys, steep mountain forests in the interior or suburban housing plots in the regions: none of it is worth much any more. “If you own or inherit land, and you’ve no route to use it, then it’s a burden,” says Masuda. “You have to pay asset taxes, you have to maintain it. There are more and more cases of people begging for someone to take their land — even for free.”

偏僻山谷中的小塊田地、內陸地區(qū)的陡峭山林，或者這些地區(qū)的郊區(qū)住宅用地，現(xiàn)在都不值什么錢了。“如果你擁有或者繼承了這樣的土地，又沒有使用的途徑，那它就成為一個累贅，”增田說，“你還得繳納資產(chǎn)稅，還得維護它。越來越多的人祈求他人拿走他們的土地——甚至不要一分錢。”

This year, Japan’s parliament will offer its first answer: a law letting public bodies make use of unowned land on leases that automatically renew every five years, with rent paid into trust for any owner who comes forward. That would solve the problem with roads.

今年，日本議會將首次就此問題給出答案：頒布一項法律，允許公共機構以租賃的方式使用無主土地，租約每五年自動更新一次，租金支付給信托，以待業(yè)主未來某一天出現(xiàn)。這將解決道路修建時遇到的問題。

But it will do nothing to address the underlying issue of land with no identifiable owner, says Shoko Yoshihara of the Tokyo Foundation, a think-tank. “It’s not that there’s no owner at all,” she says. “They’re just hard to find.”

但這無助于解決一些土地“所有者不詳”這一根本問題，日本智庫東京財團(Tokyo Foundation)的吉原祥子(Shoko Yoshihara)表示：“并不是沒有業(yè)主，只是很難找到。”

The roots of the problem lie deep in Japan’s legal system. Land registration is not compulsory; rather, it is a civil law procedure designed to let owners protect their property rights and use them as collateral. Land left unregistered is not lost but simply unrecorded.

問題的根源在于日本的法律體系。土地登記不是強制性的。相反，它是一項民法程序，旨在讓所有者能夠保護其財產(chǎn)權并將資產(chǎn)用作抵押品。沒有登記的土地并未丟失，只是沒有記錄。

When all land had value, all the owners registered it. But heirs to worthless parcels of land have no reason to register their interest simply so that the taxman knows where to find them. Add in an inheritance law modelled on France and Germany, which gives all children a statutory share of their parents’ assets, and land ownership quickly becomes hopelessly opaque.

過去，所有土地都值錢的時候，土地所有人都進行了登記。但當一塊土地變得不值錢時，繼承人沒有理由去登記他們的所有權，那不過是讓稅務人員知道哪里能找到他們。再加上日本繼承法效仿法國和德國模式，所有子女都有權繼承父母資產(chǎn)中的法定部分，這導致土地所有權變得非常不透明。

Compulsory land registration is one option under government consideration. Yoshihara doubts even that would solve the problem, however, given the costs involved. “Even if it were a duty — if it doesn’t make financial sense, will everybody obey the rules?” she asks.

實行強制性土地登記是政府正在考慮的解決方案之一。不過，由于所涉及的成本，吉原懷疑即使這么做也無法解決問題。她說，“即使這是一項法律義務——如果不能產(chǎn)生經(jīng)濟效益，每個人都會遵守這些規(guī)定嗎?”

The ultimate answer may involve something more profound: a fundamental shift in how the Japanese people relate to their mountainous island home. “Until 30 years ago, people thought of land as the greatest asset of all, something that always rises in value,” says Masuda. “Recently, with the fall in the population, the attitude to land has been transformed. But the system hasn’t evolved with it. What we need isn’t a minor change, it’s a full model shift.”

最根本的解決方案可能涉及某些更加深刻的東西：日本人與多山島嶼上的房產(chǎn)的關系需要發(fā)生根本性轉變。“30年前人們都認為土地是最大的資產(chǎn)，其價值一直在增長，”增田說，“最近，隨著人口下降，人們對土地的態(tài)度也發(fā)生了變化。但制度并沒有與時俱進。我們需要的不是小調整，而是徹底轉變模式。”

Such a shift could involve what Yoshihara calls a “receptacle” for Japan’s unwanted land. “When an elderly person owns a mountain or a field, and their children have moved to Tokyo, we need to provide more options,” she says.

這種轉變可能包括建立一個吉原所說的接納日本無主土地的管理機構。她說，“當一個老人擁有一座山或一塊田地，而他的子女已經(jīng)搬到東京時，我們需要提供更多的選擇。”

At present, local governments usually refuse to accept gifts of worthless land, because of the legal liability and management costs that come with them. They could be obliged to take it, however, or the government could set up a public body to hold land. That could turn a problem into an opportunity. In an ever more crowded world, what could the nation do with new swaths of public land?

目前，地方政府通常會拒絕接受無價值土地的捐贈，因為需要承擔隨之而來的法律責任和管理費用。但是，他們可能不得不接受，或者政府可以成立一個公共機構來擁有這些土地。這可能會把問題轉變成機遇。在一個日益擁擠的世界里，對于這些新?lián)碛械拇罅抗餐恋?，日本能做些什么?

“We’ve always had the principle in Japan that land should be privately owned — that it should belong to someone — but we may have to transform that to something else,” Masuda says.

增田說，“在日本，我們一貫的原則是，土地應該歸私人所有——它應該屬于某個人——但是，我們可能不得不改變這一原則。”

Japan’s environment paid a heavy price for its decades of rapid industrialisation. Almost everywhere on the islands is touched by human activity. Strong private property rights, laissez-faire development and an addiction to infrastructure projects let cheap apartments and factories spring up in even the quietest mountain valleys.

日本的環(huán)境為數(shù)十年的快速工業(yè)化付出了沉重代價。各個島嶼上幾乎所有地方都有人類活動的痕跡。強大的私有產(chǎn)權，政府對開發(fā)采取放任態(tài)度以及對基礎建設項目的癡迷，導致即使在最寧靜的山谷，也能冒出價格低廉的公寓和工廠。

“If we can gather together as much of this land as possible in some kind of public body then we can make a big contribution to the environment,” says Masuda, citing the potential for nature reserves or forestry carbon sinks.

增田說，“如果我們可以通過某種公共機構將這類土地盡可能多地匯集起來，那么我們可以為環(huán)境做出巨大貢獻。”他指出，一個潛在用途是建立自然保護區(qū)或森林碳匯。

That would make Japan a different kind of place. For Masumoto at the transport ministry it will be enough simply to avoid cases such as the former cemetery owned by 40 people — or rather by their 240 heirs. Three of them are still missing. The acquisition process has lasted more than two years. The negotiations continue.

那將使日本的現(xiàn)狀大大改觀。對于國土交通省的正本來說，這就能使他們避免道路建設過程中遇到的各種障礙，比如40個人——或者說由他們的240個繼承人擁有——的一塊前墓地。其中三人仍未找到。購買土地的過程已經(jīng)持續(xù)了兩年多。談判仍在繼續(xù)。

Robin Harding is the FT’s Tokyo bureau chief 譯者/何黎