With fertility rates at an all-time low and Japan increasingly aging, Oji Holdings is the latest company to undertake such a move.
For a period exceeding ten years, the nation’s sales of adult diapers exceeded those of infant diapers.
In 2023, there were 758,631 births in Japan, a 5.1% decrease from the year before.
Since the 19th century, there have been fewer births in Japan than ever before. That number was above two million in the 1970s.
A statement from Oji Holdings’ subsidiary Oji Nepia states that the company currently produces 400 million baby diapers annually. Since 2001, when the company achieved its peak production of 700 million diapers, production has been declining.
The largest diaper manufacturer in Japan, Unicharm, claimed in 2011 that sales of adult diapers had overtaken those of infant diapers.
