The structure and policy of fragile communities in hilly and mountainous areas

关于农业政策和丘陵山区农村政策的讨论，已成为农村社区讨论的焦点。但这项研究在社区本身并没有取得很好的进展。本研究抓住了丘陵山区脆弱群落的动态和现状，得出了以下结论：1.统计数据证实了“居民、土地、社区”的退化正在进行。特别是最近出现了一种新的灭绝社区的趋势。2.村子里的活动取决于人口。尤其是30-年龄段的人口(初龄人口)与村落的生机息息相关。造成的问题之一是，由于人口向城市地区的流失，初级人口大幅减少的小村庄，特别是与农业生产有关的活动变得令人沮丧。3.简言之，丘陵山区脆弱社区的政策应该针对低初级人口的“小村庄”。

Rural communities (shuraku) has come to be focused on the discussion about the agricultural policies and the rural policies in hilly and mountainous areas. But the research is not making good progress on the community itself. There are extremely few researches that analyze what characteristics the communities have and how they are changing.This research catches the dynamics and the present state of fragile communities in hilly and mountainous areasThe conclusions are as follows :1.It is confirmed according to the statistics that the degradation of "inhabitant, land and community" is going on. Especially there is seen recently a new tendency of extinct communities.2.The activity in a hamlet is dependent on the population. Especially the population from 30 to 64 years old (the primary-age population) relates closely to the vitality in a hamlet. One of the problems caused is that activities related especially to agricultural production become depressing in the hamlets where the primary-population has decreased considerably due to population drain to urban areas.3.In short, the policies of fragile communities in hilly and mountainous areas should target at the "small-scale hamlets" of low-rate prime-population.