Abstract
Damages caused by the recent large-scale earthquakes such as the Mid Niigata Prefecture Earthquake in 2004 and the 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku Earthquake vary a great deal both in form and in scale from those of the past natural disasters. Those damages revealed the limitation of existing institutions such as laws and programs for post-disaster restoration. As for the restoration of farmland and agricultural facilities, “the restoration to original-form” is a basic principle, which does not allow their improvements. In restoration process of disaster-affected areas, however, there is a compelling need for a new principle of restoration that allows the improvement of farmland and facilities for disaster prevention and agricultural rationalization. In addition, well-coordinated implementations of different restoration works, using an administrative plan, such as reconstruction plan, are of crucial importance in restoration process. The current mode of restoration under the idea of “the restoration to original-form” does not provide such an opportunity, which sometimes causes wasteful investments. In this paper, we examined limitations of existing institutions for the post-disaster restoration of farmland and agricultural facilities and suggested their improvements and the way of coordinating different restoration works based on disaster level.
