Japan has made a gradual shift in agricultural policy away from a price support to income compensation program, in which professional farms (Ninaite) depend heavily on direct payments for their livelihoods. The direct payment scheme is not only in line with international treaties agreed on at the WTO, but also a transparent system from taxpayers’ viewpoint. However, it remains to be examined empirically to what extent the scheme affects farm managerial performance and whether the targeting of subsidization is consistent with the policy ideal of fostering as many Ninaite as possible. Using a stochastic frontier production function, we evaluate the causal effect of direct payments on technical efficiency and compare the efficiency among various managerial types. Our estimation result shows that more subsidized farms are less technically efficient for BC (biochemical) and M (machinery) processes and that individual farms with a relatively large size are comparable with community-based farms (amalgamations of small farms) in terms of technical efficiency.

This paper aims to examine whether the discussion about the definition of early modern village （近世村）, oaza （大字） and rural community （農業集落） is useful for improvement of the autonomous village theory, reviewing Japanese rural history from a long-term perspective. In 1987 Hitoshi Saitoh set up a theory that existence of early modern villages, which improved the ability of autonomy through negotiating with rulers, caused the great success of the Japanese cooperative movement. This theory was named the autonomous village theory. It is not only applied by scholars who are interested in foreign countries, including Vietnam or Uzbekistan, but also opposed by many Japanese historians, whose major is Modern Japan. The opposition leaders focus on one of Saitoh’s arguments that the unit of cooperative movement at the beginning should be the early modern village and it was an oaza and rural community, too. Trying to take advantage of this “weak point”, the opposition leaders insist that Saitoh’s other arguments are also wrong, showing statistical analyses of the relationships among the early modern village, oaza and rural community, ignoring the historical contents of these three kinds of units. A review of historical studies of Japanese rural history suggests that not only administrative units but also agricultural production units had been formed dynamically from ancient times until modern times, repeatedly splitting and integrating. So the relationships among the early modern village, oaza and rural community are never historically consistent. In conclusion, the criticism based on statistical analyses is not fatal to the most important original arguments of the autonomous village theory and is limited to partial discussion.

The objective of this paper is to analyze the characteristics of food consumption in aged-couple and aged-one-person households ; thus, households consisting of an aged couple or aged single are focused on in the study. The expenditure elasticities of household food consumption are estimated with Engel functions by using corresponding data from the National Survey of Family Income and Expenditure. The main findings from the empirical study imply that the food consumption of both aged-couple and aged-single households have a tendency to depend on the outsourcing of their meals.

In recent years, intellectual property (IP) rights are increasingly essential to improve competitive power in agriculture. The purpose of this study is to propose directions of future research concerning IP rights. An analysis of existing literature on IP rights in agricultural economics, law and business administration changes along with policy trends reveals three crucial directions : 1) to apply IP management theory to the agricultural sector ; 2) to investigate effective use of different IP rights in agriculture ; and 3) to consider the characteristics of public communities which agricultural IPs have.

This study examined whether consumer knowledge, such as breed or place of production, of regional meat brands, would enhance brand evaluation of the products. We conducted a questionnaire survey in 2015 for the consumers of Kagoshima kurobuta, Joshu mugibuta, and Tankaku, which are brands of meat. Structural equation modeling revealed that knowledge was positively associated with high evaluation and the willingness to purchase the brand again. Compared to consumers in Tokyo, consumers living in the prefectures where the meat was produced tended to have a higher estimation of its value owing to their emotional evaluation based on attachment.

Compared with the prediction results from a previous study using the Census of Agriculture, many small- and middle-scale dairy farms have sustained themselves in Hokkaido. The main factors are as follows. First, there are many farmers with a scale down. Second, famers over 65 years old continue to operate their farms. Third, especially in small-scale farms, there are some new-entry farmers.

This study analyzes farmers' motivations for adopting Kohnotori-hagukumu Nouhou (KHN), a conservation-oriented farming method for nurturing oriental storks, thus reducing pesticide use and promoting organic farming. The adoption of KHN poses risks to farmers. Hence, identifying individual farmers' motivations is crucial for an effective and efficient diffusion of KHN. In this respect, we find that the strongest motivations for adopting KHN include the cultivation of higher quality rice, increasing profits, and growing premium-branded rice. Finally, most farmers' adoption decisions are not led by an inclination toward storks' conservation, although KHN was originally designed for the conservation of this species.

The objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of the increase in the consumption tax rate on household demand for food items and domestic production and import of food through the decrease in the household demand, by using demand system analysis and input-output analysis, respectively. Results include that the effects of the increase in tax rate of 8% to 10% with a reduced tax rate system on consumption of food items can vary, and the effects on domestic agricultural and livestock productions can be negative.

To counter the crop-raiding by wildlife, community-based measures are practical and desirable. To promote the measures, the role of local government is important, though little has been investigated in this aspect. Thus, this paper sheds light on such measures by a questionnaire survey to the head of local communities to contrast different policies in Oita and Chiba Prefectures. We made a comparative analysis of the conducted measures between the two prefectures and found that it is important for this purpose to provide not only subsidies for the measures but also to build a flexible and cooperative relationship among local people concerned.

The purpose of this study is to consider the development of the Farmland Bank land its factors, focusing on the relasionthip with the JA organizations in Ibaraki Prefecture. In Ibaraki, 3,627 ha of farm and were gathered for Farmlands Bank from 2014 to 2015. It is 5^th largest area in Japan. The Farmlands Bank in Ibaraki outsources its business only to municipalities, but the JA organizations are not involved. However, high performance in Ibaraki could be achieved just by the transformation from illegal farmland leases to utilization rights without any relationship with JA organizations. Our analysis shows that we have to focus on pre-conditions of the farmland market when we evaluate the farmland Bank's performance.

In this study, we have surveyed the process of collaboration between regional agriculture,commerce and industry on a special red pepper in Ohtawara City, Tochigi Prefecture. The main object of this study was to clarify how the collaboration played a role in the development of the production area. The main outcomes are as follows : Local commercial entities adjust the interests between the farmers and a food company. The company provides seeds of the red pepper to farmers for free and buys the products from them at a high price. These activities encourage the development of the production area.

The objective of this study is to analyze the characteristics of food consumption in young-aged households from the viewpoint of their income difference and household characteristics. Accordingly, young-aged households are classified as a double-career or a single-career household, and households containing only husband and wife, or households with children. The expenditure elasticities of household food consumption are estimated with Engel functions by using corresponding data from the National Survey of Family Income and Expenditure. The main finding from the empirical study is as follows ; although young families have a tendency to depend on convenient food, large expenditure elasticities of homemade meals, which indicate a heavy contribution of homemade meals to the diet, are also observed for relatively low income families.

In this paper, we focused on cooperation between different industries in manufacturing and agriculture, and examined the background of technological innovation and the conditions for continuing cooperation as a project with the use of economics concepts and case analysis. As a result, we found that the change in the economic environment of each cooperating entity in recent years is an incentive for technological innovation. As a condition for establishing cooperation that contributes to agricultural technological innovation, farmers' understanding of new technologies, mutual trustbuilding, and long-term business planning of the manufacturing industry are indispensable.

This paper investigates how the food industry carriest out food-education activities and their effects on beneficiary families by focusing on the Kewpie Company's program. The data were collected by a questionnaire survey to the parents of school children who were the beneficiaries of this program conducted at school as "a delivery class". We employed an ordered probit model to analyze how the effect of the food-education program on the dietary habits of school children and the mothers' impressions of Kewpie varies according to the attributes of households.

The purpose of this study is to clarify meaning of entries into the agricultural sector by welfare facilities for persons with disabilities owned by private companies. These activities have many varieties, but they can be classified into four types by the way in which they were established. Compared with social-welfare corporations and special subsidiary companies, those welfare facilities have many strengths in the agricultural world. As a result, they will become the farms which can support the regional agriculture where they are located and we should support their activities in the agricultural sector.

This study analyzes the social system for disabled people by combining living support and creation of opportunity in agriculture. A case of focus is Saitama Fukko Co., Ltd. in Kumagaya City, Saitama Prefecture. The main results are as follows. Saitama Fukko Co., Ltd. forms a social system for agriculture based on living support projects for persons with disabilities. We can evaluate this social system as generalizable. The company assumed the risk, which led to the stable management of an NPO Group Farm, and plays a significant part by mediating collaboration between agriculture and welfare in the area outside the corporate group.