In this paper, a brachiopod fauna (the Tairagai fauna), consisting of 11 species in 11 genera, is described from the uppermost part of the Odaira Formation at Tairagai in the Yokota area, South Kitakami Belt, northeastern Japan. The age of the fauna is identified as the late Visean (early Carboniferous). Palaeobiogeographically, the Tairagai fauna has a close affinity with those of western Europe (the UK, Germany and Belgium), central Russia (southern Urals and Kuznetsk Basin), Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and northwestern China (Xinjiang and Gansu). The South Kitakami region probably was located near the North China block in the late Palaeozoic, and tectonically belongs to the CAOB.