JAPANESE SOURCES OF SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL INFORMATION

Japan, like Great Britain, is an island nation, small in area but thickly populated and highly industrialized. Its existence depends on a flourishing export trade, and there is not much doubt that it leads the countries of the East at present in scientific and technological development. (Whether it will be overhauled by China within the next ten or twenty years remains to be seen.) To maintain its lead and to cope with an expanding demand at home and overseas for improved industrial techniques, it needs an extensive programme of scientific research. Some £35 million was spent by Japanese industry on research during 1958. This is carried on in Japan by four main types of research organization: government‐controlled research institutes and experimental stations, both national and local; the universities; business firms and trade research organizations; and learned societies in every field of study.