Soni Village
Hidekazu Shibata

Soni Village affiliated with the Most Beautiful Villages in Japan in 2009. There are the signs of the organization everywhere in the village. And we actually encounter fascinating beautiful scenes as we walk around.

Miniature landscape –the village with beautiful scenes everywhere.

Soni Village is a valley called Soni Valley and nine colonies called taiji are located along the Soni River, national and prefectural highways. It is a village with tourist attractions where 500 to 600 thousand tourists visit annually. The peak of the tourism is in the beginning of November, when Japanese pampas grass is at its best, spreading across Soni Kogen Highlands. It is popular as a day-trip highlands resort because it only takes about two hours from Osaka and 1.5 hours from Nara City by car.
Three major pillars that support the village economy are forestry, agriculture and tourism. Soni Village Agriculture and Forestry Public Corporation, established in August 2016, aims to train successors in agriculture and forestry as well as to brand local products. In addition to agriculture, forestry and tourism, each colony started to make the most of its own characteristic in an attempt to diversify the village’s industry using its local resources. One of the local specialties can be the processed product of mandarin-like citrus fruit called yuzu. Local people are working in cooperation to develop various processed food products which only Soni Village can produce.
A unique attempt is the town promotion using killifish. On the west edge of the village, in the district called Yamagasu along Ise Main Road, there is an area called Medaka (killifish) Main Road. About ten households breed and sell more than 30 different species of killifish.
I myself was born and raised in Soni Village. I think the scenery of Soni Highlands is the highlight of the village but there are beautiful scenes everywhere in this village, as if it is a miniature landscape. I will do my best to protect the nature and make the most out of it to make Soni Village “the homeland which makes you want to live forever.”

Interviewed in October, 2016
Writer : Hideko Takahashi / Photographer : Hiroyuki Tamura