2019 Volume 38 Issue Special_Issue Pages 163-169
Income of land improvement districts (LIDs)—spent on the operation, maintenance, and management of irrigation and drainage facilities—has depended on an annual membership fee. However, this income has decreased as LIDs have undergone reduction in farmland and farmland areas. The maintenance and financial management of LIDs warrants improvement, and therefore, LIDs have taken two main measures: to acquire various financial sources other than an annual membership fee and to improve the financial basis for reorganizing LIDs. However, if the area reduction is large, it may cause dissolution of organization. To take measures for suppressing area reduction, we investigated the actual situation of district exclusion and settlement money income, which is paid by the members who applied for district exclusion. We first understood the reason for district exclusion in LIDs and how settlement money is collected. Next, we counted the number of district exclusions in 10 years and examined its relationship with urbanization areas. The main findings were as follows: (1) In LIDs, 0.5-7% of areas was excluded. (2) The primary reason of LID exclusion is farmland converted into residential land and for public works. (3) In urbanization areas, small areas of LIDs are continuously converted into residential land; in other areas, a large number of large areas of LIDs were converted for public works in a short period. (4) Finally, although there are LIDs with large settlement money income, there are also those where settlement money is exempted.
