Abstract
In this study, the authors conducted a hearing survey to comprehend the activities and challenges of 24 areas that have been participating in the project named “paddy fields for the cradle of fish” in Shiga Prefecture, and classified those areas based on local features obtained in the survey. As a result, the 24 areas were classified into three major groups: Type I) most of them are located in Kohoku or Koto-Region, giving priority to ensuring rice yeild rather than value adding, shipping cultivated rice to Japan Agriculture (JA) mainly, and being with relatively weak activities; Type II) most of them located in Kosei-Region, giving priority to value adding than ensuring the yeild, selling rice through their own marketing route, and being with weak activities; and Type III) all of them located in Konan or Higashi-Ohmi-Region, shipping rice to JA mainly, and being with strong activities. In addition, with these features of respective groups, some feasible measures to increase the area of project fields could be contrived.
