Multi-Stakeholder Environmental Assessment (MS-EA) in Small-Scale Private Industrial Forest in Kochi Prefecture

今年的研究成果包括成功分析了将最近建立的日本林务员制度实施到地方专家风险调解（Local Expert risk Mediation， LERM）的协同风险管理过程中的潜力，从而有可能在当地私营工业林中引入环境影响评价。通过从当地森林官员那里收集定性数据，采用了一种基于理论的方法。研究发现，目前林农的活动通常仅限于提高圆木生产的效率，因此没有显示出与环境影响评估早期阶段相适应的特征。这很可能是由于管理呈现出严格的自上而下的特点。从理论和实践的角度来看，在森林管理的核心范围内实施林务员扮演调解人的角色，有可能实现自下而上的管理，从而为小规模私营林业实施环境影响评估提供空间。

Research achievements this year include the successful analysis of the potential of implementing the recently established Japanese forester system into the collaborative risk management process of Local Expert Risk Mediation (LERM) for the possibility to introduce environmental impact assessment in local private industrial forest. A grounded-theory approach was conducted by collecting qualitative data from local forest officials. It was found that at the current time activities by foresters are usually limited to enhancing the efficiency of roundwood production, and therefore do not show characteristics compatible to the early stages of EIA. This is likely to the fact that management shows strict top-down characteristics. An implementation of foresters to take role of mediators within the core of LERM has, from a theoretical and practical perspective, the potential to enable bottom-up management, and therefore allow room for the implementation of EIA in small-scale private forestry.