Milestones in sanitation
1888 Tokyo Municipal Improvement Commission set up; this came about after the cholera epidemics of 1879 and 1886 in which over 100,000 people suffered got the disease.
1889 A report filed by British engineer, B K Burton, on municipal improvement of Tokyo; he was asked to do the same for Shimonoseki (May 1893), Sendai (1893), Nagoya (1894), and Hiroshima (1894).
1900 Filth and Cleansing Law and the Sewerage Law passed; maintainence of public and private lands and also dealt with issues concerning garbage, sludge, grey water and human excreta.
1920 Filth Cleansing Laws partially revised; partially treated wastewater could be discharged into drains, sewers and rivers.
1921 Flush Toilet Control Regulations; these established, for the first time, standards for johkasou construction, quality of wastewater discharge, and maintenance and management.
1938 National Institute of Public Health is established; its goal is to train public health personnel and performing research on public health.
1950 Building Standards Act enacted; stipulated that the johkasou was to be a multi-chamber septic tank with a trickling filter and a disinfectant tank.
1952 Recommendations by the Science Council of Japan that the problem surrounding human excreta be resolved; this triggered a decisive thrust in research and development of human excreta technology at universities, public research agencies and in the private sector.
1952 The city of Kawasaki uses vaccum trucks for the first time to clean johkasou and vault toilets.
1954 Public Cleansing Law enacted replacing the Filth Cleansing Law of 1900; Instead of getting the johkasou installation cleared by the prefectural governor, this could now be obtained from construction superintendants; this law also determined that water quality standards stipulated in regional ordinances be used as a general gauge for discharged wastewater.
1954 Legal basis established for provision of government subsidies for human excreta treatment plants constructed, maintained and managed by municipalities and multi-municipal associations.
1956 Government prescribes standards for the construction of human excreta digestion tanks specifically with respect to anaerobic digestion treatment tanks.
1957 The Japanese cabinet resolves to adopt tripartite plan for sewage and water supply administrative system; the construction ministry was responsible for sewage lines; the health and welfare ministry for sewage treatment plants and water supply systems; and the ministry of international trade and industry for industrial water supplies.
1957 Nearly all Japan's cities using vaccum trucks.
1958 New Sewerage Law; also laws to preserve quality of public waters along with regulations on factory effluents enacted.
1965 Basinwide sewage system begins functioning for the first time in the Neya river basin.
1967 Basic Law for Environmental Pollution Control enacted; water quality environmental standards laid down as pollution in rivers, lakes and the ocean accelerated; Sewerage Law partially revised.
1970
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