Electronic voting in Niimi. (Niimi City)

Many local governments are trying a number of different ideas to revitalize their areas, and information technology is proving to be one of the most promising methods. Remote towns and villages have high hopes that IT will allow them to overcome the disadvantages that come from being located so far from metropolitan areas.

Village Quadruples "Population" Through E-mail
Oguchi (site is Japanese only) is a village located in Ishikawa Prefecture. With fewer than 800 residents, Oguchi is the smallest municipality in all of Ishikawa. In November 1999, though, this village office launched what it calls the "E-mail Oguchi Citizens Program," and as of July 2002 its virtual population had grown to include 3,251 people across Japan. Anyone can register online to receive an e-mail magazine published by the village office, and most of the subscribers live outside Oguchi. About half of the readers reside in Ishikawa Prefecture, but many of the others are located in cities like Tokyo and Osaka and even in faraway places like Hokkaido to the north and Okinawa to the south.

One of the good things about e-mail is that distance is never an issue; subscribers can receive their copies of the e-mail magazine from the village office in an instant, no matter where they may be. The magazine offers seasonal information, informs readers about such events as organized hikes in the woods, and provides details pertaining to local ski resorts and hot springs. People are encouraged to make inquiries by e-mail if they desire additional information.

Four times a year, the village office holds a get-together for all the "netizens" of Oguchi via e-mail. People from outside the village are taking part in the events, and the local tourism industry is seeing some benefits. Some of the participants say that they have become attached to Oguchi through being in contact with its residents.

New System Improves Transparency in Bidding Procedure
Kanagawa Prefecture's Yokosuka City is making an effort to bring its city office online, and the local government launched what it calls the "Online Bidding System" in 1999. The computerized system has greatly improved transparency in public-works projects by handling the entire process from when companies make bids until the contractor is chosen.

Yokosuka had already put in place a system for expanding competition among firms in the bidding process, and the new online system has taken this effort one step further. Information on each order is posted publicly on the city office's website, and interested contractors can download an application form. After filling in the relevant information, they can send it back online. After reviewing applications, the city office then decides whether or not the contractors are qualified. Once a decision has been made, the city office posts the results of the successful bid along with the other bids on the Internet. One contractor said of the new system, "The winning bidder is no longer chosen arbitrarily, and everything is now above board."

Other local governments have expressed a great deal of interest in this system and have made inquiries to the city office.

Electronic Voting Debuts in Japan
Electronic voting was tried for the first time in Japan this past June in Okayama Prefecture's Niimi City (site is Japanese only), as citizens chose their mayor and representatives for the municipal assembly by touching the names of candidates displayed on a computer screen. People's choices were stored on CompactFlash cards, and once the polls had closed, these cards were taken to a central location where the votes were counted electronically.

There were two candidates for mayor and 22 candidates for 18 positions in the municipal assembly. A total of 19,381 people cast ballots, a figure equal to more than 86% of registered voters in the city. While two officials tallied all of the electronic ballots and had the results within just 25 minutes, the 1,763 absentee ballots that were cast required 56 workers and two hours to count by hand. Electronic voting has proven to be very efficient, and the example in Niimi has increased the chances of it being embraced across Japan.