In Japan, up until two decades ago, many young people were fascinated by large cities. They were willing to study or work there. In fact, a lot of young people came to large cities, especially Tokyo. Exciting city lives were really appealing to them. As a matter of fact, at the time, there were a lot of things that you could obtain only in Tokyo. As a result, Tokyo came to have more population, and more things and information have naturally concentrated in Tokyo. Today, young people, in contrast, tend to remain in their hometowns, saying that Tokyo has nothing to attract them. Tokyo appears to give them negative impressions like hectic lives, a high cost of living and unfriendly people. It's been said that the great popularity of the internet has contributed to create this tendency since the internet enables people anywhere to get anything they want. I've heard that more university graduates who studied in large cities want to work in their hometowns or in mid-sized cities near their hometowns.
These days, some of the younger people try to do something in order to revitalize their hometowns which are suffering from shrinking population and poor economic conditions. Under these circumstances, a few days ago, the 5th contest for grade-Blocal dishes called B1 Grand Prix/B1 グランプリ was held. This contest caught considerable public attention and was widely reported in the news. Actually, winning the contest is an effective way to boost the local economy and attract people throughout Japan. I'll talk more about the contest in the next post.
