The Miike Coal Mine where we are was registered as a World Cultural Heritage in July 2015 in recognition of its role as part as one of "Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution - Iron & Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining."

About Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution

Amazingly Rapid Process of Industrialization Achieved by Japan

　Japan successfully achieved the transfer of technology from the West in a short period of 50 years from the middle of the 19th Century through to the start of the 20th Century, an era also characterized by the transition from national isolation and the feudal society of the Edo Period to the industrial state of the Meiji Period and Japan's successful industrialization in the fields of iron, steel, shipbuilding and coal mining.

　Such rapid establishment of an industrial state in a region outside of the West during this period was an unprecedented historical phenomenon. Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution spans 8 prefectures and 11 cities, and 23 component parts. When combined, these heritages tell the story of Japan's industrial revolution from inception to maturity.

Fusion of Advanced Western Technology with Traditional Japanese Techniques

　Rapid industrialization in Japan was a product of national will. 　Technological development was achieved in stages by obtaining information of advanced Western technologies and progressively combining it with traditional Japanese techniques. This process was, in other words, the result of technology exchange between Japan and the West.

　The various heritages that make up Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution are a testament to the fusion of traditional techniques and technology development. When viewed as a whole, they tell the story of this technology exchange with the West and how it resulted in Japan's rapid industrialization.

　The Miike Coal Mine is regarded as the completion of this industrialization in Japan's coal sector.

Value of Miike Coal Mine as Part of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution

　The value of Miike Coal Mine can be integrally understood as an industrial system consisting of the pit where coal was mined, the railway used for transportation, and the port charged with overseas exportation, all of which have been well preserved to the present day. In terms of raw materials and energy these elements are closely intertwined with iron, steel, and shipbuilding and represent a crucial page in the history of Japan's Industrial Revolution.