Source: MAFF, “Fact-finding Survey on Urban Farming” (released in October 2011)

(3) Exchanges between urban and rural areas and enhancing links between farmers and consumers

[Direction of policy measures as indicated by the basic plan]

- Promoting Exchanges between urban and rural areas by creating new exchange demand in rural areas, by securing and training human resources in urban and rural areas and by utilizing rural areas for education, medical services and nursing care.

- Promoting urban residents’ understanding of functions and effects of urban agriculture, protecting urban agriculture, stepping up efforts for sustainable urban agriculture promotion to allow urban farming to fully produce its functions and effects.

① For green tourism (where tourists stay in rural areas for leisure activities), various imaginative efforts have been implemented in line with local conditions.

② According to the FY2010 Census of Agriculture and Forestry, in FY2010 there were 636,000 farm households in urban areas accounting for 25% of Japan’s total farm households and 658,000 hectares or 14% of the nation’s total cultivated land.

③ According to a survey on urban farm households, the cultivated land under management per urban farm household is 60% of the average for all Japanese farm households.

④ Urban farm households produce mainly open field vegetables and paddy/upland rice. Those with annual sales at 7 million yen or more produce mainly open field and protected vegetables.

⑤ A urban agriculture promotion panel has been created to consider how best to conserve urban farmland and promote urban agriculture.

(Managed cultivate land area per urban farm household) (Survey results)

(Produced agricultural crops (multiple answers))

Category	Farmland in urbanization promotion area	Farmland in urbanization control area	Total	(Reference) Average for all farm households
Agricultural land reserved in urbanization promotion area
Total	36.3a	16.1a	38.2a	74.5 (56%)	133.1 (100%)

Sources: MAFF, “Fact-finding Survey on Urban Farming” (released in October 2011), “Census of Agriculture and Forestry (2010)”

⑥ Building on health promotion and other functions of agriculture, programs have been promoted to link agriculture to healthcare and welfare.

[Specific program] :Shimada Kensetsu Corporation, Narita City, Chiba Prefecture

An outpatient nursing care facility encourages users to grow vegetables and flowers at a farming garden.

The company cooperates with a university in a scientific study on the effects of the activity.

☐ Elevated flowerbeds have been developed to allow elderly people to work without bending over. These flowerbeds have also been introduced to other facilities.

[Specific program] :Agricultural production corporation Nagahori, Ageo City, Saitama Prefecture

☐ The corporation expands its crop acreage by recycling and leasing abandoned cultivated lands and employs many local elderly people for harvesting and classifying komatsuna, a vegetable similar to spinach.

☐ The corporation allows new employees to freely choose time periods for their work, creating an environment where it is easy for elderly people to work.

○ Elderly people made positive comments: “I have become more vigorous and healthy,” “I am now more healthy than before my retirement,” and “I feel pleased to communicate with friends.” The program not only creates jobs but also produces significant effects for elderly people, including introducing new meaning for life and health promotion.