Abstract
This paper aims to examine forestry education from the perspective of residents who live in Sasayama, Hyogo prefecture, Japan; an education that arose in an attempt to maintain a ‘sustainable utilization’ of local resources by the local residents. The purpose of forestry education is to some basic knowledge about forest areas, so they know how to look after such areas and can co-exist with the forest. Furthermore, this study suggests that the purpose of forestry education is the rebuilding of the relationship between people thorough the experiences on / about / in the forest. In addition to that, the opportunity of playing in the forest should be the purpose of forestry education because even children in rural areas felt afraid of going into the forest. Among residents, in collaboration with the local government and companies produce purchasable items such as desks made from locally sourced wood, and this is important for the local government’s ‘sustainable’ policy regarding forests. Forestry education has the possibility to build an interactive relationship between the local economy in partnership with environmental education, and this study details how such a partnership may be possible.
