The area of present-day Iitate was part of
Mutsu Province. During the
Edo period, the area was part of the holdings of
Sōma Domain. After the
Meiji restoration, on April 1, 1889, the villages of Iiso, Osu and Niitate were created within
Sōma District, Fukushima with the establishment of the modern municipalities system. On April 1, 1942, Osu and Niitate merged to form the village of Odate, which then merged with Iiso on September 30, 1956 to form Iitate. In September 2010, Iitate was designated one of
The Most Beautiful Villages in Japan.
2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster Iitate suffered from moderate damage from the
2011 Tōhoku earthquake, and was located outside the nominal radiation exclusion zone of the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. However, as a result of wind patterns following the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, on 30 March 2011, the
International Atomic Energy Agency stated that its operational criteria for evacuation were exceeded in Iitate, despite the village being outside the existing radiation exclusion zone around the plant. As a result, the entire population of the village was evacuated by government order on 22 April 2011. Some displaced children from the village were shunned after relocating for fear of contamination. In early June about 1,500 residents remained. In 2012, local government obtained responses from a survey from some 1,743 former residents began experiencing growing frustration and instability due to the nuclear crisis and an inability to return to the lives they were living before the disaster. Sixty percent of respondents stated that their health and the health of their families had deteriorated after evacuating. Summarizing all responses to questions related to evacuees' current family status, one-third of all surveyed families live apart from their children, while 50.1 percent live away from other family members (including elderly parents) with whom they lived before the disaster. The survey also showed that 34.7 percent of the evacuees have suffered reductions in income of 50 percent or more since the outbreak of the nuclear disaster. A total of 36.8 percent reported a lack of sleep, while 17.9 percent reported smoking or drinking more than before they evacuated. However, in March 2014, the government postponed lifting of the restrictions on return for a year due to remaining high levels of radiation. The evacuation order was lifted on April 1, 2017, with the exception of a small area in southern Iitate bordering on the neighbouring town of Namiie, which remains a no-entry zone. However, only a third of the former residents expressed an intention of returning. ==Economy==