I started with the idea of riding half way clockwise around Lake Biwa, then thought I might be able to drive all around the lake, then convinced myself that it is too large a lake to go around it in one day, and finally followed my original plan. Lake Biwa has been studied since the 1950's, and is the poster child of the many issues and interests that develop around a large lake. Its watershed is comparatively small, as is usually the case with lakes, and just by chance happens to be mostly within one prefecture.
Prefectures, in Japan, are akin to states in the US, but are much smaller in surface area. There are 47 prefectures in Japan. They do have a governor and I presume a prefecture congress. There is a larger political grouping, called a region. There are 9 regions in Japan, but you never hear about what the regional government does or doesn't do. And of course there is a central federal government.
Going back to Lake Biwa, the prefecture decided to keep responsibility for issues related to the lake, rather than let the central government take charge (a bit how California has kept all environmental issues under its jurisdiction, rather than let US EPA run the show). Lake Biwa is the main source of drinking water for the prefectures of Kyoto and Osaka, who are always worried about the reliability of their water supply, plus they are both worried about potential flooding threats. But they have to humbly petition the prefecture of Biwa to address these issues, for which Biwa charges a pretty penny.
Then we have the issues of water quality at the lake, the agricultural needs of the Biwa prefecture, and the environmental conscience of the Japanese, which like the environmental conscience in the USA, suddenly woke up with a start in the late 1960's early 1970's. To take a historic approach, in the post World War II years Japan was in dire need of agricultural production, so the wetlands around the lake (deltas formed where the rivers entered the lake) were drained to allow for more rice paddies. Suddenly in the 1980's people discovered that wetlands were not wasted land after all, because of the many environmental services they provide. Then came the increase in phosphorus and nitrate because of ag runoff, so in the 1970's there was a flurry of legislation and engineering to minimize ag runoff and treat sewage. Trillions of yens were spent, but the overall effects in water quality have been barely detectable. The public and the politicians forgot the concept of residence time of a contaminant, which takes into account the level of the contaminant (moderate), the volume of the lake (ginormous), and the rate at which water is replaced (tiny). I believe that they have done the right moves, but a few millennia will have to pass before a significant change will be detected.
Regarding the loss of wetlands, somewhere in the 1990's legislation was passed to encourage the development of reed belts around the lake. The idea is that the patches of reeds would serve as nurseries for the lake critters, protect the coast from erosion (not that there is that much coastal erosion in a lake), and trap any contaminants being shed from the shore. As far as I can tell that initiative has fallen flat, either because the road hugs the coast very closely, or because shipping facilities need a "clean" shoreline, or beaches are being protected for recreational purposes.
Looking at the beautiful lake I don't detect big troubles, but am still glad the folks here have been willing to invest big money to prevent exacerbating conditions of environmental concern. On a historical note, in the 1960's the women of the Biwa prefecture protested against phosphate-bearing detergents because of the prevalence of diaper rashes in babies, eczema on the hands of mothers, and (minor) concern about the effects on fish. These "soap" protests led to the enactment of the Soap Legislation, banning the manufacture and use of synthetic phosphate-bearing detergents within the prefecture, which according to the locals was the first time, anywhere in the world, that such an "environmental" legislation was enacted (the Soap Laws were then used as the model of similar legislation in the US and Europe).
Tomorrow I will move to the south end of Lake Biwa, and two days later I will head for Osaka and the end of my Japan trip.
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