The paper discusses the issue of ecotourism development in Japan, particularly in rural areas filled with modified natural environment. Based on a case study of Iida, it argues that the origins of ecotour, which emphasize environment conservation, are hardly suitable in these areas. Instead, it is rather a combination of conventional tourism (i. e. school excursions) and alternative tourism (i. e. experience-based and home-stay programs). We would like to discuss this method as “ecologicalizing” process in school excursions. The model is called “ecotourism” by the Ministry of Environment because it has adopted the ecotourism-oriented managerial skills through a shift to local management.

The paper makes a contribution by explaining why a semi-governmental tourism stock company is effective, both economically and socially, for local governments to revitalize rural areas. By these explanations, the paper gives a hint to distinguish ecotourism businesses initiated by the Ministry of Environment and green tourism businesses by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery. This lesson is also valuable for local governments in other developing countries such as Vietnam, who want to increase the economic scale of ecotourism without scarifying sustainable principles. The final part of the paper concerns two issues of the Iida’s model: namely the participants’ degree of satisfaction towards its programs, and the current situation of home-stay providers, with suggestions for improvement.

This paper uses the case of disaster prevention activities in Nagoya to consider the potential of voluntary organizations in local governance run by the voluntary and public sectors. To this end, the paper first traces how voluntary organizations and local governance are developed, and then shows the functions, problems and geographical characteristics of that local governance.

The recent voluntary activities related to disaster prevention in Nagoya derive from experiences of voluntary activities in the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake in Kobe in 1995. Many people in Nagoya were involved with voluntary activities in Kobe, and some of them established an NPO in Nagoya to maintain continued support for victims and to prepare for future disasters based on the knowledge gained by ‘studying the affected area.’ Then a massive flood struck the Nagoya area in 2000. From this experience, the government of Nagoya City recognized the importance of voluntary activities at times of disaster, and launched a training program for coordinators of disaster volunteers in 2002, which was outsourced to the NPO. As the city government was not well informed about voluntary activities, the NPO was able to conduct the program based on its own knowledge and ideals. This program triggered the establishment of more community-oriented groups for disaster prevention in Nagoya. In parallel, these groups and the NPO tried to develop a relationship between voluntary organizations and the public sector to more effectively conduct their activities. Eventually, a collaborative framework (local governance) on disaster prevention between the voluntary and public sectors was established in 2005.

This governance provides support for afflicted people at times of disaster, and contributes to disaster prevention activities in normal times in Nagoya. Institutionally, the geographical area of the governance corresponds to the territory of the city, but the governance has links to voluntary organizations and supports affected areas outside Nagoya. Knowledge and information acquired through external relationships and activities outside Nagoya are used in activities in Nagoya. The reason why the local governance constructed these links was because this governance was constructed mainly on the initiative of the voluntary organizations, and so the principles behind their activities, such as ‘studying the affected area,’ can be maintained.

Through these findings, this paper argues that voluntary organizations have the potential to take key roles in constructing and managing local governance run by the voluntary and public sectors, without losing their autonomy.

Japanese premium beef called wagyu has a global market potential with its eating quality. However, it is not Japan but Australia that has significantly expanded its export. Australia is now the largest wagyu supplier in the global market, which notably includes Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore, and Dubai. As so-called “wagyu” in Australia is cross-bred, it is not always identical to the authentic Japanese wagyu in terms of genetics or quality. Nevertheless, Australian wagyu beef has been highly valued in top restaurants and hotels outside Japan. This paper illustrates the development of the wagyu industry in Australia by focusing on the dynamics of the beef supply chain, and examines the future of the industry.

Wagyu was first introduced to Australia via the U. S. A. in the early 1990s. Before the 2000s, Australian wagyu used to be grain-fed by Japanese feedlots only for the Japanese market, but the market shrunk dramatically after the outbreak of BSE followed by the stricter labeling regulations in Japan. For making up the missed market, Australian wagyu was promoted domestically and to other Asian countries by Australian feedlots.

The wagyu beef supply chain in Australia is as follows: Stud breeders supply wagyu bulls for commercial breeders, and the commercial breeders cross-breed the bulls with their female cattle. Those cross-bred steers are supplied to feedlots, where wagyu cattle are grain-fed for 300-500 days. The feedlots promote their wagyu brand for the international markets, and the markets are expanding spurred on by economic growth and the boom in Japanese cuisine. There are reportedly around 10,000 full-blood wagyu cattle and 130,000 cross-bred wagyu cattle in Australia in 2012.

Although wagyu became popular globally in the late 2000s, the wagyu supply chain in Australia is facing a greater risk caused by the overlong feeding-period with the high grain prices and inconsistent beef quality. Smaller producers in the chain are withdrawing, and several companies are integrating the chain vertically instead. Those integrated companies will be the pivotal player in the wagyu industry in Australia, and they may further improve the quality of Australian wagyu. It should also be noted that the genetic resources of wagyu such as semen and embryos are being exported further abroad, and that will potentially lead to increasing wagyu production in other countries in Asia, Europe, and South America.

This paper aims to present evidence showing that internal migration affects fertility decline which is called the Second Demographic Transition.

In Japan, the trend of fertility decline has become obvious since around 1990. This trend is mainly caused by the late-marriage tendency of women born in and after the 1960s and 1970s. In addition, more women of these generations migrate into the Tokyo metropolitan area and tend to remain living there. This change in the migration pattern contributed to the expansion of net-migration to the Tokyo metropolitan area since the later half of the 1990s. Women born in the 1960s and 1970s play a major role in these two phenomena, and an idea is hypothesized that there is some sort of relationship between fertility decline and the expansion of the net-migration to the Tokyo metropolitan area since the later half of the 1990s. To approach this relationship, this paper tries to investigate whether marriage behavior in the Tokyo metropolitan area is different from the places where the women come from. Therefore the proportion of unmarried women who migrated into the Tokyo metropolitan area before getting married and that of the women who come from Tokyo there were compared.

The results show that the difference of the proportion of unmarried women (that of the women who migrated into the Tokyo metropolitan area before getting married minus that of the women who come from there) has expanded greatly in the 30-34 and 35-39 year-old age cohorts in the women born in and after the years 1966-1970. This result means that in the newer generation, the women who migrated into the Tokyo metropolitan area before getting married have a stronger tendency to late marriage than the women who come from there. However, the tendency to late marriage of the women who migrated into the Tokyo metropolitan area before getting married has only a slight influence on the proportion of unmarried women in the Tokyo metropolitan area and in Japan.