Daitō Islands
| Nickname: Ufuagari | |
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Map of the Daitō Islands
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 Daitō Islands
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| Geography | |
| Coordinates | 25°50′34″N 131°14′26″E / 25.84278°N 131.24056°E |
| Adjacent bodies of water | Philippine Sea |
| Total islands | 3 |
| Administration | |
| Region | Kyūshū / Ryukyu Islands |
| Prefecture | Okinawa |
| District | Shimajiri |
| Demographics | |
| Population | 2,107 (2010) |
| Pop. density | 45.83 /km2 (118.7 /sq mi) |
| Ethnic groups | Japanese |
The Daitō Islands (大東諸島 Daitō-shotō?) are an archipelago consisting of three isolated coral islands in the Philippine Sea southeast of Okinawa. The islands have a total area of 44.427 square kilometres (17.153 sq mi) and have a population of 2,107.
Administratively, the whole group belongs to Shimajiri District of Okinawa Prefecture, and is divided between the villages of Minamidaitō and Kitadaitō, with uninhabited Okidaitōjima island administered as part of Kitadaitō municipality, although physically located closer to Minamidaitōjima.
Kita, minami, and oki means, respectively, "north", "south", and "offshore" while daitō means "great east".
These islands have long been known in Okinawa as Ufuagari (“the Great East”). The islands were first sighted by the Spanish navigator Bernardo de la Torre on 25 September 1543 (Okidaitōjima) and a few days later still in September (Minamidaitōjima and Kitadaitōjima), during his abortive attempt to reach New Spain from the Philippines with the San Juan de Letran. They were visited later by European explorers of various nations, and were commonly known as the Borodino Islands after a Russian vessel surveyed them in 1820.
The islands remained uninhabited until formally claimed by the Empire of Japan in 1885. In 1900, a team of pioneers from Hachijōjima, one of the Izu Islands located 287 kilometres (178 mi) south of Tokyo led by Tamaoki Han'emon (1838 – 1910), started a settlement on Minamidaitōjima, and began cultivating sugar cane. He subsequently led colonization efforts on Kitadaitōjima and Okidaitōjima. Those two islands had substantial deposits of guano, which was mined for phosphate-based fertilizer and gunpowder. By 1919 the population was more than 4000 people.
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