The study purports clarification of regional characteristic of the environmental movements to oppose the Project of Land Redamation in Lake Nakaumi, which also includes a sub-project to alter the two brackish lakes, Lake Nakaumi and Lake Shinji, into freshwater lakes. This project has been suspended by the pressure from these movements. Precisely speaking, the sub-project to alter the lakes into freshwater lakes was actually cancelled in 1988, and the main project to reclaim land from Lake Nakaumi is still a matter of controversy between the local goverments and the local residents. The subject of this paper is to examine the movements which continued to the time when the former project was cancelled. The opponents against the project consisted of people who lived around the lakes, especialy fishermen gathering shijimi clams and citizen of Matsue city. These movements, which were expanded rapidly and widely during 1980's, made remarkable regional differences in the development process. It is possible to see these movements from three points of regional dichotomy. The first is a relation between Tottori and Shimane prefecture, which explains the characteristic of the organization and spatial extent of the movements. The second is that between Lake Nakaumi and Lake Shinji, which explains the characteristic of the concern of residents and strategy of the movements. The third is that between the urban area and the rural area, which explains the charactor of the leaders and the supporters. The movements might ultimately inquire how to evaluate and make use of these two lakes as the regional resources. In this case, many people hoped Lake Shinji to be preserved as a brackish lake which would provide shijimi clams and many kind of fish, and which would be an essential element of the landscape in an old city, Matsue. So the movements laid a stress on the preservation of Lake Shinji, though the projects would have worse influences upon Lake Nakaumi. An environmental preservation movement reflects the figure of the region facing environmental plobems. To clarify the regionnal characteristics in the environmental preservation movements is important not only for the study of social movement theory but also for the study of regional development planning and environmental management.

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The purpose of this paper is to clarify the characteristics of part-time farming and the mechanism of its evolution in Okawa city, Fukuoka prefecture and its surrounding rural areas, emphasizing the effect of the local labor market. The auther pays special attention to the local labor market composed of indigenous industry. For this purpose, the auther examines following issues. 1) Characteristics of the local labor market mainly composed of the furniture industry. 2) The characteristics of agricultural management in rural areas. 3) The relation between the agricultural management and the local labor market, and the expansion of part-time farming in rural areas. This paper then examines occupational structures of farm households at two selected agricultural settlements to make clear the effect of labor market expansion on farmers. The results are summarized as follows. 1) Production in furniture industry has risen by an adoption of the mass production since the 1950s. Consequently the development of this industry has created new employment opportunities. 2) Labor market in cities such as Saga and Kurume region have also expanded due to the growth of tertiary industries. 3) Labor saving in agriculture caused by mechanization increased surplus laborers in farm households. Therefore above mentioned situation accelerated the shift to part-time farming. A number of laborers in the farm households are engaged in non-agricultural work in full time condition. As a result part-time farmers changed their agricultural management reducing or giving up the production of laber intensive crops.

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Ageing in population is one of the most crucial issues in present Japan, especially in the depopulated areas such as Chugoku Mountains. However, rate of ageing is different from place to place and the problems they face are various. This paper aims to examine the daily-life behavior and its spatial patterns of elderly people in rather inconvenient and difficult condition in such areas. The author interviewed 41 elderly villagers at the selected two settlements, Yodohara-ichi close to the central village and Gokiya in peripheral area, in Mizuho-cho, Shimane Prefecture located in the heart of Chugoku Mountains, for a comparative analysis. The main results obtained are summarized as follows; 1) Most of the elderly people are mainly engaged in agriculture. They spend large part of time on watching TV, listening to the radio and reading in their dally activities. Therefore, their activities tend to take place within their own settlements. Some of them positively take part in social activities. Many social activities are carried out in the central village, and elderly people living near the central village and those who own cars or motorcycles in peripheral area are able to participate in their favorite social activities. However, elderly people without cars or motorcycles in peripheral area tend to take part in the social activities only when they can easily get transportation such as free buses. 2) Shopping of elderly people tends to depend strongly on the nearest shopping facilities. Men who can drive cars or motorcycles and women who live close to the central village frequently go shopping, while women in peripheral area do only occasionally, because they have to depend on poor bus services. In the latter case, they often use mobile shops which peddle close to their houses. 3) Similar to the shopping behavior, most of the elderly people use the nearest general practitioner for medical care. However, some of them visit hospitals located in other towns by car or bus for better medical treatments. Patients living far away from medical facilities receive periodic transportation services, usually once a week, provided by the municipal authority, which is very important not only in visiting doctors but also in shopping. Elderly people who live close to the general practitioner visit doctors more frequently than those who live away from them. On the other hand, the latter consult public health nurses more frequently than the former. 4) In depopulated mountain villages, people commonly move by car. Therefore, there is a strong spatial restriction for elderly people especially women without private transportation methods.

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