The developed countries are losing their ruling power in the world economy in the WTO era. And the tidal wave of the negotiations and conclusions of the Free Trade Agreements leaded by them means that now the FTAs are the measures for new division of the world market against the important emergent countries (BRICs). In 2006, it began the new aspect in the world agriculture by the adoption of new bio-energy policy of the Bush-Regime of the USA and the China's changing to the enormous grain imports country. In the new aspect of the globalization in the world agriculture and trade, the regeneration of the local economy plays an important role as Countermeasures against the globalization, which has contributed exclusively to increasing of profits of agribusiness multinational corporations. Especially in Japan, in which the economic declining of local areas is extremely serious, it needs the conversion of the conventional production and distribution system, which is characterized by the formation of major source of fresh agricultural products and an abundant supply to the metropolitan area, to the new development of local market and a local distribution system. And active leading roles of agricultural cooperatives are expected for this conversion.

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The stronger relationships between farmers and consumers are needed in CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) than in other local food marketing. In this paper, it will be showed how the partnerships between farmers and shareholders work in CSAs, and the meanings of CSA as a farm management strategy through the case studies in Wisconsin and Illinois. It will be also reveal the existence of the partnerships around outside of CSAs by examining the CSA support networks in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

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This paper investigates the actual conditions and problems that characterize the local distribution that food business practices create with respect to the progression of globalization. The globalism that has progressed post-1990's influences the social economy of Japan dramatically. It impacts greatly on agriculture and traditional industries, separating the distance between producer and consumer and increasing risks regarding food safety for the consumer. Under such circumstances, local distribution, with suppliers and dealers offering local farm products and peculiarities of the region to local consumers, is practiced in many places nationwide. Recognition of the importance of the local agriculture has been refreshed and local promotion and education about healthy eating is also positively influenced. It is important to be opposed to globalization and to protect local agriculture and foods in a cooperative manner; as such action widens, a more stable structure of the local distribution will emerge.

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Since the latter half of 1990's, food safety has been threatened. Social mutual agreement about what trust that should recover where zero risk can not be is still remains to obtain. Without obtaining social mutual agreement, information disclosure is attached to importance. Little attention has been given to the point about the consumers' receptivity of food safety and information, and the traceability of vegetables has been introduced. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of the traceability in vegetables and fruits through the close examination of the efficiency obstruction of the market that asymmetric information brings and the reception and dispatch of information between the food systems. Main findings are as follows. 1 Necessary information exists together to risk information while the risk of vegetable is not clear. There is no risk to need recall. It is not easy to say that information that the consumer cannot judge is a safety information. 2 In the market of the vegetables and fruits, neither the market failure nor asymmetric information that should be supplemented with the traceability putting the cost exist. How the information cost is put to construct the relation where the face is seen between consumer and producer opens to dispute. 3 The communicative function of traceability is used for the cultivation technology improvement. The consumer is sure to have the sense of security in the systematization of the producer's effort in the food system. It is necessary to back up the policy as an infrastructure as a social common capital for the achievement the function of the traceability.

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In Toyomatsu Village, its agriculture production has tended to specialized in tomato production, which is a typical example of vegetable production fields in intermediate and mountainous area, Chugoku area. These vegetable production fields have suffered from an increasing percentage of aging farmers. Although they introduce labor saving technology and supporting system for farming activities, the scale of production has been decreased. Tomato production in Toyomatsu shows the same tendency. However, tomato farming has other problems as regards labor, beside the increasing number of aging farmers. Successors of tomato producers, regardless of whether or not they live together with them, are familiar with rice producing technology, but not be trained with tomato producing technology. Those successors who engage in non-agriculture activities have little vision about the family business of their households, so that the producers tend to decide to cease tomato production. Therefore, sustainable development of vegetable production may require a system of transferring producing technology to any conceivable successors, including new comers and farmers having retired from outside-faming activities. This is because they will possibly grow up to play an important role in vegetable (and tomato) production. It is necessary for vegetable producing areas to keep a certain scale of production in order to make such a system work effectively.

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Recently, Chinese Government has introduced food certification systems attributed to the food safety issue. The main purpose of these systems is to differentiate between high and low quality goods. Most previous surveys analyze the rates of "perception" and "purchasing experiences" of certified goods, in order to evaluate the promotion effect of these certification systems. However, the above indicators were theoretically inadequate from the point of view of certification system. To more robust of former studies, we propose a new indicator, which is the rate of "continuous purchasing goods with a certification mark after comprehending this system". Results from consumer survey conducted in Dalian city, shows that only 38% for Green Food and 24% for No Pollution Food among observations are willing to continue purchasing certified food after understanding this system. Besides, 30% of observations are purchasing Green Food continuously without comprehending. Therefore, promotion effort is prerequisite to secure the availability of consumer's choice in China.

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[in Japanese]

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This article clarifies the factors determining the differences in efforts toward fresh fish branding among fisheries cooperative associations in Nagasaki Prefecture. Our analysis, based on questionnaire survey data of 44 fisheries cooperative associations, clearly suggests that the more volume of high quality fresh fish are available in a certain quantity, the fisheries cooperative associations are more likely to engage in fresh fish branding.

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[in Japanese]

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The purpose of this paper is to clarify the developments of hop farm management and the current situation of hop contract cultivation. On the basis of results of investigation for the hop farmers in Karumai Town and two beer companies, this paper analyzes the management of hop farm, the content of contract cultivation, and the evaluation of farmers for the contract cultivation. The study shows that: 1) the location of hop has been concentrated on the most favorable area, 2) the current situation of the hop contract cultivation is very strict with hop farmers, so the relation between farmers and beer companies can't be said to be equal and the farmer are in the inferior situation.

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This study is required to overcome the problems with domestic soybeans. In this circumstance, the author discussed the current situation of the use of domestic soybeans and the evaluation and issues of soybeans as ingredients of processed food, based on the results of the interviews with 9 tofu producers inside Japan, with the purpose of using the study results as future references for producers and farmers' cooperatives to design measures for quality improvement. Consequently, it was found that tofu producers highly evaluate the safe and reliable image, high quality, and good taste of domestic soybeans, while being concerned about the instability of quality and sorting of domestic soybeans, and their unstable quantities and prices. In this study, the author clarified the details of such issues by referring to concrete cases.

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Japan's self-sufficiency rate of the roughage gradually has been falling. The volume of roughage import increased rapidly in the 1980's and it still keeps increasing. The main exporting country/area is western region of the United States. However it is imported without any precise standards of the product in both the exporter side (the United States) and the importer side (Japan). This lack of standards is one of the main obstacles to low commodity price and its stable quality. In addition, some of the Japanese importers are advancing to the United States. Still, it is difficult to reduce the cost by the advantage of bulk transaction and mass transportation because of the commodity characteristics.

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This paper is to clarify features of land's marketing in China from the reformation and the developing process of land's marketing, and from the mechanism of transactions & the decision of the price of land. The features are as follows: 1, Land's marketing in China is an infiltrating process from the reform of city's government-owned land in the latter half of 1980's to the reform of group ownership land after 2000. 2, Transfer price of government-owned land is based on the market price. It means that the use of government-owned land is entrusted to the market mechanism in principle. 3, Land's marketing in China is still imperfect, immature.

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[in Japanese]

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This paper clarifies what type of consumers are more likely than others to check food labels. Based on an internet questionnaire survey of 310 respondents residing in the Tokyo Metropolitan area, Chiba, Saitama and Kanagawa, the results suggest that consumers who are likely to frequently check the food labels will fulfill the following characteristics: (1) they are female, and middle-aged or elderly; (2) they read newspapers and watch TV health programs frequently; (3) they frequently make and eat dinner with family members; and finally, (4) they frequently purchase organic foods. In addition, they also pay more attention to the place of origin when purchasing vegetables and meat.

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