e-Stat Japan Statistics Scraper

Extract official Japanese government statistics from the e-Stat API. Search 6,000+ datasets covering population, GDP, trade, employment, and more. Returns bilingual JP/EN labels with automatic wareki-to-Gregorian date conversion.

What is e-Stat?

e-Stat is Japan's unified government statistics portal, operated by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. It aggregates statistical data from all major Japanese ministries and agencies. The e-Stat API v3 provides programmatic access to 6,000+ survey tables covering:

• Population: Census, vital statistics, household surveys
• Economy: GDP, industrial production, corporate statistics
• Labour: Employment, wages, working hours
• Agriculture: Crop production, livestock, fisheries
• Trade: Import/export by commodity and country
• Health & Education: Medical facilities, school enrollment

Getting Started

1. Register for a free API key at https://www.e-stat.go.jp/api/
2. Enter your appId in the actor input
3. Choose a mode: catalog to search tables, data to fetch records

Modes

Catalog Mode (mode: "catalog")

Search the statistical table index by keyword, subject area, or publishing ministry. Returns metadata for matching tables — use this to discover statsDataId values for data mode.

Input example:

{
  "appId": "YOUR_APP_ID",
  "mode": "catalog",
  "searchWord": "population",
  "lang": "E",
  "maxItems": 50
}

Output fields:

Field	Description
stats_data_id	Unique e-Stat table ID (use in data mode)
stats_name	Survey series name
statistics_name	Specific table name within the survey
title	Full table title
government_org	Publishing ministry or agency
cycle	Survey frequency (annual/monthly/etc.)
survey_date	Survey period code
open_date	Publication date (YYYY-MM-DD)
small_area	True if municipality-level data is available
overall_total	Total number of data cells in the table

Data Mode (mode: "data")

Fetch actual data cells from one or more specific table IDs. Supports multi-dimensional data with area, time, and category axes.

Input example:

{
  "appId": "YOUR_APP_ID",
  "mode": "data",
  "statsDataIds": ["0003448237"],
  "lang": "E",
  "maxItems": 1000
}

Output fields:

Field	Description
stats_data_id	Source table ID
area_code	JIS prefecture/municipality code
area_label	Area name (Japanese)
area_label_en	Area name (English)
time_code	Time dimension code
time_label	Time label as reported (may include wareki)
time_gregorian	ISO 8601 normalized year (wareki converted)
cat01_code	Category dimension 1 code
cat01_label	Category dimension 1 label
value	Numeric data value
unit	Measurement unit
annotation	Suppression flag (* or -)

Filtering Options

Catalog Mode Filters

Input	Description	Example
searchWord	Keyword search across JP and EN metadata	"population"
statsField	Subject area code	"02" (Population)
governmentOrg	Ministry code	"00200" (Statistics Bureau)
lang	Label language: "E" (English) or "J" (Japanese)	"E"

Common statsField Codes

Code	Subject Area
02	Population / Households
03	Labour / Wages
04	Agriculture / Forestry / Fisheries
05	Mining / Industry / Construction
07	Trade
08	Finance / Insurance
09	Government Finance
13	Health / Social Security
14	Education / Culture

Wareki Date Conversion

Japanese government data frequently uses imperial era years (令和, 平成, 昭和, 大正). This actor automatically converts them to Gregorian years in the time_gregorian field:

Japanese	Gregorian Offset	Example
令和 (Reiwa)	+2018	令和6 → 2024
平成 (Heisei)	+1988	平成30 → 2018
昭和 (Showa)	+1925	昭和50 → 1975
大正 (Taisho)	+1911	大正5 → 1916

Rate Limits

The e-Stat API free tier allows up to 100,000 requests per day with no monthly limit. The actor uses a conservative 200ms delay between requests to stay well within limits.

Large Tables

Some e-Stat tables contain millions of data cells. Use maxItems to limit output:

• Catalog mode: up to 100,000 table entries per search
• Data mode: no hard per-table cap, but use maxItems for manageable runs

Output Format

All records are flat JSON objects. Unused dimension fields (e.g. cat02_* when a table only has one category dimension) are omitted from output.

Example Use Cases

• Track Japan's annual population by prefecture over time
• Monitor labour market statistics (unemployment, wages) by industry
• Analyze agricultural production trends
• Research bilateral trade flows by commodity
• Study historical demographic data with wareki-to-Gregorian conversion