In this paper the development process of milk industry in Fukushima Prefecture is described by analyzing the inter-relationships of city milkers (Sakunyu GyRsha), dairy farms and milk product processing companies. But the main attention is paid to the transformation of dairying with the expansion of Tokyo metropolitan milkshed.
Fukushima Prefecture has changed to a dairying area after World War II from a horse producing one of the prewar period. But even in the prewar period the dairy cows were kept by city milkers and others. Above all, the Iwase Pasture in Kagami-ishi had contributed much to the development of milk industry by lenting cows to 12 city milkers located along the Tohoku Railway from Utsunomiya to Sendai. Some dairy farms emerged in the Fukushima Basin by introducing a dairy product processing company called the Morinaga Tohoku-Nosan Co. Ltd. in 1937. At first the company encouraged the farmers to grow more dairy cows. Then, dairy cows were diffused southward and eastward during and after the war. The company therefore could gather milk produced in all Fukushima Prefecture exclusively until 1956. But the milk price controlled by this monopolistic company was kept so low for the dairy farmers that one of the dairy farmers co-operatives in Motomiya-machi introduced another dairy product company called the Kyodo-nyugyo.
Southern part of Fukushima Prefecture was a target area of many companies to fulfill the shortage of fluid milk in Kanto areas after around 1960. The expansion of Tokyo metropolitan milkshed to this area has accelerated not only the trend to keep many dairy cows on farms but also the north-south movement of the core region of dairying in Fukushima Prefecture. Thus, the southern part of Fukushima Prefecture, a marginal area of Tokyo metropolitan milkshed, was influenced directly by the large demand of fluid milk distributers in Tokyo in summer.

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Rice cultivation in alluvial fan areas along large rivers in Japan has rapidly de-veloped in the past one hundred years. This development chiefly depends upon the improvement of irrigation systems with large-scale land improvement works.
In this paper, the author attempts to analyze the process of the irrigation systems in the Kurobe Alluvial Fan after the 1910's from the spatial viewpoint. The study area is located in Central Japan facing the Japan Sea and more than 95% of its arable land is devoted to paddy fields. Irrigation water taken from the Kurobe River is distributed through several diversion dams to many tributary channels and paddy fields. Establishment of spatial orders should, the author thinks, be dependent upon the follow-ing principle of hierarchical organization irrigated areas by canals directly conducted from the Kurobe River form the highest spatial order of irrigation system. Water management of this order of irrigation system is carried out by irrigation cooperatives or administrative agencies. The second spatial order is formed by areas of the tributary channels of the above-mentioned major canals. Areas served by the sub-divided tribu-taries are classified to be the third spatial order ones. Finally, a small sum of paddy fields of each farmer forms the lowest spatial order area. Water supply of this order is controlled by the farmers owning those fields. This hierarchical structure can be defined to be the Spatial Organization of Irrigation System.
Considering changes in the network of irrigation channels and their supply areas, three different stages of spatial organization in the irrigation system can be found in this region.
The First Stage (ca. 1890-1930): there were fifteen areas of the highest spatial order, each of which had its own intake and they were rather independent on each other in terms of the supply and demand system (Fig. 2). Their major concern was directed to the maintenance of intakes and diversion dams within their areas, otherwise they would have had to face water shortage.
The Second Stage (ca. 1930-1969): after the construction of small hydro-electric power plants on this fan, the irrigation water system changed. Thirteen intakes out of the fifteen were abolished, and two large intakes were newly constructed at the dam-site of power plants. Thus, the thirteen areas of the highest spatial order were re-organized into two by the newly established two irrigation cooperatives along the new canals originated from the diversion dam. The remaining two areas still kept their original intakes and did not join the new cooperatives. The number of the highest order became four in this stage (Fig. 8), which fact means that even larger areal units of the spatial organization appeared and the spatial independence of the thirteen areas became less strong keeping their initial function to irrigate paddy fields to some extent.
The Third Stage (After 1970): with the development of land consolidation, the network of irrigation channels has improved considerably by reforming the meticulous flow of canals and ditches. In this process, areas of the lowest spatial order have been newly delineated in accordance with the improved channels (Fig. 14). Nevertheless the areas of the highest spatial order have not changed, the Third Stage could be established, because of the reformation of the lowest order groups. Fig. 15 shows the process of the spatial organization of irrigation system in the Kurobe Alluvial Fan.

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