Introduction / Appendix

Data & Links

This appendix gathers figures on Tokyo's forestry and timber industry in three parts: figures, timber prices, and policies and links. Figures are based mainly on the Tokyo statistical report Tokyo's Forests and Forestry, 2025 edition.^[1]

Tokyo's forests in figures

Tokyo forestry in numbers

Log production for sawn timber fell from 140,000 m³ in FY1960 to 42,000 m³ in FY2023.^[1] Forestry output is about 0.1% of Japan's total. Although forests cover 40% of Tokyo, its timber industry is very small.

Forest area by municipality

Forests are concentrated in a few towns and villages. Okutama alone holds more than a quarter of Tokyo's forest.

Unit: ha. Green = Tama, brown = islands. Bar length relative to Okutama = 100. Source: Tokyo's Forests and Forestry, 2025 edition^[1]. Log production and output by municipality could not be extracted from this report.

Timber prices

Timber prices compared with a bowl of gyudon

Log and timber prices are easier to grasp when compared with everyday purchases. Here they are compared with a bowl of gyudon (beef bowl), whose price in Tokyo's wards is tracked in national statistics. In 2025 a bowl of gyudon (eating out) cost ¥489.^[2]

Log prices are 2025 national average raw-material prices from the Forestry Agency report; gyudon is the Tokyo-ward price from the Statistics Bureau. The price of one post is calculated from the per-m³ price of cedar squared lumber by volume and differs from actual retail prices. To think in bowls of soba, divide by the price at a local shop.

A cubic meter of cedar logs costs about as much as 30 bowls of gyudon. Before it becomes a log, it takes more than 50 years of weeding and thinning after planting (Chapter 2). Sawn and dried, its price rises about fivefold per cubic meter. That the decades of growing it in the mountains are barely reflected in the log price is one reason Tama's trees go uncut.

Past timber prices, counted in today's bowls of gyudon

Past prices cannot be compared with today's as they are. So they were converted into 2025 yen using the consumer price index and divided by the 2025 price of a bowl of gyudon, ¥489.^[2][4][5] "Logs" are the price sawmills pay; "standing trees" (stumpage) are the price for trees sold still standing in the forest, after deducting the cost of felling and hauling—roughly the forest owner's share.

Logs are national average prices for medium logs; standing trees are stumpage prices per 1 m³ of usable volume (as compiled by the Forest and Forestry Learning Center, originally from the MAFF Timber Supply and Demand Report and the Japan Real Estate Institute's survey of forest land and stumpage prices).^[6][7] The 2025 log price is from the Forestry Agency white paper.^[3] Prices were converted using the national consumer price index (all items, 2020 = 100): 17.9 in 1960, 30.9 in 1970, 73.2 in 1980, 89.6 in 1990, 97.3 in 2000, 94.8 in 2010 and 111.9 in 2025.^[4][5] Indexes before 1969 are "all items less imputed rent" and are not strictly continuous. The 2024 stumpage figure is the price at the time, not adjusted for inflation.

The price of 1 m³ of standing cedar, in today's bowls of gyudon. Bar length is scaled with 1970 as 100.

In nominal terms prices peaked in 1980, but adjusted for inflation, cedar logs were most valuable around 1960–70, at about 140 of today's bowls of gyudon. Today they are about 31 bowls, roughly a quarter. The standing-tree price—the forest owner's share—fell much further, from about 98 bowls in 1970 to about 8 in 2024, less than a tenth. The stumpage price is what remains after the cost of felling and hauling is deducted from the log price. In nominal terms, logs were ¥39,600 and standing trees ¥22,707 in 1980, and ¥15,900 and ¥4,127 in 2024: logs fell to about 40%, while standing trees fell below 20%. This is because the difference (the share going to felling and hauling) did not shrink as much as the log price.^[6][7]The Forestry Agency's white paper likewise says that stumpage prices in 2016 were 12% of the 1980 peak for cedar and 14% for cypress.^[8]

At the prices of the day they were planted, the trees planted by earlier generations should have become a major asset for their children and grandchildren. Many of the trees now ready for harvest were planted in that era, during the postwar expansion of plantation forestry (Chapter 2).

The consumer price index converts prices by the rise in the cost of everyday goods as a whole. Converting by wage growth would give different results. A comparison with timber prices in the Edo period has not yet been attempted.

Policies and links

Subsidies and taxes

Forest Environment Transfer Tax (FY2024)

The Forest Environment Transfer Tax distributes the national Forest Environment Tax to prefectures and municipalities. In FY2024, Tokyo received ¥204.5 million for the metropolitan government and ¥1.84 billion in total for its municipalities.^[9]

Sources: Tokyo, Forest Environment Transfer Tax Use Cases FY2024^[10]; Forestry Agency allocation data^[9]

The 23 wards, which have almost no forest, receive more than 60% of the transfer. The largest use by municipalities was wood use and promotion, ¥1.34 billion. Forest maintenance was ¥340 million, savings into funds ¥384 million and human resource development ¥6.1 million.^[10]

The total of the uses does not match the total transfer. The figures are given as in the source.

Examples of Tokyo subsidy programs

Links

Government

• Tokyo
  Tokyo Bureau of Industrial and Labor AffairsIts Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Department handles forests and forestry and publishes Tokyo's Forests and Forestry (Japanese)
• Tokyo
  TOKYO MOKUNAVIInformation site on wood use in Tokyo (Japanese)
• Tokyo
  Tokyo Waterworks BureauManages the watershed forests of the upper Tama River
• National
  Forestry AgencyAnnual forest reports; Forest Environment Transfer Tax data
• National
  Kanto Regional Forest OfficeManages national forests including Mt. Takao and Ogasawara

Public bodies and service desks

• Foundation
  Tokyo Development Foundation for Agriculture, Forestry and FisheriesForest maintenance, pollen-reduction harvesting and replanting, training forestry workers
• Foundation
  TOKYO GROWNThe foundation's portal for Tokyo's farm, forest and fishery products
• Desk
  Tama Timber Information CenterInformation and advice on Tama timber (Japanese)
• Desk
  Forestry Jobs NAVIInformation on working in forestry in Tokyo (Japanese)
• Desk
  Tokyo Forestry Support TeamVolunteer forest maintenance (Japanese)
• Desk
  Low-Pollen Forest CampaignParticipation and donations for low-pollen forests (Japanese)

These links were checked against the list on the foundation's TOKYO GROWN site.^[13]

Industry bodies (websites not confirmed)

The following bodies appear in the member list of Tokyo's forestry advisory council, but their official web addresses have not yet been confirmed.^[14]

• Coop
  Tokyo Forest Owners' Cooperative
• Body
  Tokyo Federation of Timber Associations
• Coop
  Tama Timber Center Cooperative
• Body
  Tokyo Council of Forestry Research Groups

For research

• DB
  Giant Tree DatabaseMinistry of the Environment; search about 70,000 giant trees nationwide (Japanese)
• Research
  Tokugawa Institute for the History of ForestryTokugawa Reimeikai Foundation. For its publications see Appendix: Literature

Sources

1. 東京都産業労働局『東京の森林・林業』令和7年版 PDF
2. 総務省統計局「小売物価統計調査のはなし」(牛丼の価格推移) PDF
3. 林野庁『令和7年度 森林・林業白書』第3章(木材価格) Link
4. 内閣府『令和4年度 年次経済財政報告』長期経済統計「物価」(消費者物価指数) Link
5. 総務省統計局 統計メールニュース(2025年平均 全国消費者物価指数) PDF
6. 森林・林業学習館「山元立木価格」(元データ:日本不動産研究所「山林素地及び山元立木価格調」) Link
7. 森林・林業学習館「木材価格の推移」(元データ:農林水産省「木材需給報告書」) Link
8. 林野庁『平成28年度 森林・林業白書』第3章(木材価格) Link
9. 林野庁 森林環境譲与税 譲与額資料(令和6年度) PDF
10. 東京都『森林環境譲与税 使途事例集』令和6年度 PDF
11. 東京都 報道発表「林業経営体強化に資する山の相談支援事業」(2026年6月15日) Link
12. 東京都農林水産振興財団「森林整備と林業振興」 PDF
13. TOKYO GROWN(東京都農林水産振興財団) Link
14. 東京都農林・漁業振興対策審議会 林業部会 委員名簿 PDF