Abstract
Effects of Agricultural Improvement Projects can be divided into twogroups. One group is direct effects toward the agricultural production and the other is indirect effects toward the local community and national economy. In this paper, the author clarifies the extension mechanism of the direct effects from a land consolidation project with an analytical tool of DEcision MAking Trial & Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) . A rural town, Nagi in Okayama prefecture is chosen as a case study area. The results from the DEMATEL analysis shows that the total extension mechanism of the direct effects consists of the following four sub-mechanisms.
(1) Reduction of agricultural labor and labor shift from agricultureto non-agricultural sectors,
(2) Effective and intensive use of agricultural land resource,
(3) Changes of cultivation techniques and improvement of yields and qualities of agricultural products, and
(4) Organization of farm households linking the above three sub-mechanisms into closer relations with each other.
Based on this results, the author points out that three factors, such as 1) land consolidation project, 2) adequate organization policy extended by the local government/the extension service station, and 3) subjecthood of local community capable of group adaptation, have enlarged the total amount of effects from the project to farm households in this study area.
