Prospects for Regional Agriculture in a Tsunami-Damaged Area

Multi-Unit Optimization on Consolidated Rice Fields in S Town, Miyagi Prefecture

Abstract

The impact of a natural disaster is not only from its damages to resources but the recovery project such as land consolidation also disconnects the farming situation from the previous forecast. Planning based on the current situation is hence required in order to revitalize regional agriculture. We conducted a survey of farm managers and applied a mathematical programing model in a municipality where large-plot field consolidation has been executed after the tsunami disaster. Our result shows both the number of farms and machines can be redundant because of the field improvement although few farm managers consider turning to diversified activities other than rice farming.