Just 40 of every 100,000 Japanese were incarcerated as of 2000, compared with 702 in the US and 125 in the UK, according to UK and US government figures.
Government pledges to cut spending and reduce the nation's swelling debt mean the prison system isn't growing fast enough to keep up with the increase in criminals, officials said.
The government's plan to build two new prisons, the first in more than 50 years, "won't change much -- we'll still be short of space," said Takatora Kuniyoshi, who oversees prison facilities at the Justice Ministry's corrections department.
At Fukuoka Prison, a series of two- and four-story concrete buildings where inmates do jobs such as welding and shoemaking, extra space can't come fast enough.
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