In September 2015, torrential rains in the Kanto-Tohoku area in Japan
triggered a massive flood disaster, with over 10,000 houses inundated
and over 4,000 people stranded by overtoppings and breaches of levees causing widespread flooding
around the Kinu River.
Just after this, the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism requested
that the chair of the Council for Social Infrastructure Development study
the prospect of flood control measures for flood disaster risk reduction against large-scale inundations,
and on December 10th, 2015 the council produced a report
entitled Prospect of Flood Control Measures to Reduce Flood Disaster Risk
against Large-scale Inundations:
Rebuilding Flood-Conscious Societies through Enhanced Public Awareness.
The report stressed building awareness of large-scale floods that are certain to happen at some time,
exceeding the capacity of facilities, and the need for us to prepare for them as a whole society.
Then based on the report, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT), Japan
formulated a new policy vision on Rebuilding Flood-Conscious Societies, on December 11th, 2015.
In August 2016, a series of typhoons caused many human losses due to delayed evacuation
and major economic damages induced by flood around small and medium rivers in Hokkaido and Tohoku.
In the wake of the disasters and based on the report of the council,
the MLIT partially amended the Flood Risk Management Act to include establishment of the Committee
on Flood Risk Reduction against Large-scale Inundations and the like to accelerate initiatives of
Rebuilding Flood-Conscious Societies around small and medium rivers nationwide, and implemented the Act
on June 19th, 2017.
The MLIT has also complied the immediate action plan for the Vision on
Rebuilding Flood-Conscious Societies and announced it on June 20, 2017
in order to promote the new measures and realize such society in a practical way.
Under these approaches, the MLIT will exert best efforts to rebuild Flood-Conscious Societies
as soon as possible.