Investment and Employment Strategy in Community Business for Sustainable Development of Agriculture and Rural Societies: Comparison between Japan and Europe

本研究的目的是通过日本与欧洲的比较，厘清在农村社会中建立和管理社区企业的一些基本条件。特别是运用社会经济的分析框架，对就业的创造和资本的积累进行了深入的研究。社区企业通常被称为准公共企业。它是指在一个优秀的管理能力下，当地社会内部人们合作的发展，以达到一个公共目的。农村社会有许多剩余资源，如人、自然、文化、公共娱乐、产业等。通过使用适当的技术将这些资源转化为商品，就有可能成功地恢复其社会。与欧洲相比，日本农村社会的社区商业具有以下特点。首先，对政府的依赖很大。这表明他们缺乏自主性。究其原因，是社会治理的历史较短。其次，城市居民和农村居民之间的交流是稀缺的。然而，这种情况正在迅速改变。城市居民现在要求农村居民好好招待他们。如果能获得更高的满意度，他们愿意在新鲜安全的食品、有机农产品、农业旅游和生物质循环利用系统上花更多的钱。为了满足这一需求，中介机构的发展是必不可少的，中介机构为社区商业提供资金、技术和信息。在日本，候选人是由社会企业家、农业合作社和市政当局的城市规划者领导的NPO。

The purpose of this study is to clarify some basic conditions in setting up and managing the community business in the rural societies through the comparison between Japan and Europe. Especially, we intensively investigated the creation of employment and the accumulation of capital by using the analytical frame of social economy.Community business is often called a quasi-public corporation. It indicates the development of cooperation of people within the local society under an excellent management ability to achieve a public purpose. The rural society has many left-over resources such as the person, nature, the culture, public entertainments, and industry, etc. It is possible to succeed in the rehabilitation of their society by converting these resources to the commodity under the use of appropriate technologies.Community business in the rural societies in Japan has the following features compared with Europe. First, dependence on the government is strong. This shows lack in autonomy. The reason is that the history of social governance is short. Second, communications are scarce among the citizens in the city and residents in the rural society.However, the situation is rapidly changing. The citizens in the city are now requesting nice hospitality of residents in the rural society. They are willing to pay much money in fresh and safety foods, organic farm produce, agri-tourism, and biomass recycling system if they can get a higher satisfaction. To meet this request, the development of intermediary is indispensable who supplies the capital, the technology, and information to the community business. In Japan, the candidates are NPO led by social entrepreneur, agricultural co-operatives, and the city planners in the municipality.