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NATIONAL REPORT OF JAPAN 
1. Introduction 
In recent years social and economic activities in Japan have been increasing 
remarkably. As the area of the whole land is only 370,000 km? , the effective 
land use becomes more and more indispensable, and well and long-range plans 
of national land development are required greatly. In order to meet these demands 
satisfactorily, many sorts of surveying and mapping are necessary. This report 
is to present a brief summary of the recent activities of photogrammetry in Japan 
during the past four years. 
The law of surveying in Japan was established in 1949. This law is composed 
mainly of 3 subjects, that is , regulations of national basic surveying, civil 
engineering survey and surveying enterprise. 
The national basic surveying is the base for all the other surveyings of national 
and public purposes. It includes not only geodetic surveys and aerial photogrammetry 
but also publishment of topographic maps of many kinds of scale. All these basic 
surveys are carried out by the Geographical Survey Institute (G. 5. I. ) which was 
established in 1946 as the succeeding organization of the Military Land Survey 
Department. The mapping works for land are carri ed out mainly under the super- 
vision of the. G. S. TI. The mapping works for the forest area are carried out under 
the supervision of Forestry Agency of Ministry of Agricalture and Forestry. The 
mapping works of coastal area and sea area are carried out under the supervision 
of the Hydrographic office. The private survey companies in Japan have been 
playing the important role by doing the photogrammetric works which is the main 
part of surveying recently. Approximately 1000 of the larger companies has