population, including promoting the interaction between metropolitan cities and agricultural communities, as well as people living in two districts.

### b. Curtailing Spending Drains to Outside the District

Curtailing the spending drain to outside of the district means to have more district residents shop locally and buy things that were made in the district. To think about this, it is necessary to first get a grasp on the current situation of the “place” where the residents do their shopping and the “production site” of the items purchased, in order to see which of the items produced outside of the district have a high purchase rate and whether there are items that can be substituted by products from within the district.

First, in terms of the spending “place”, it can be assumed that there is an increasing rate of shopping at the large-scale shopping centers in the suburbs and by Internet mail order. However, strategies can be planned to increase the number of shoppers coming into the district to expand consumer spending by improving access to the city center by concentrating the city functions and reconstructing the public transportation network (forming Compact Cities) to increase the convenience and attraction of the city center area.

Next, in terms of “production site” of the consumables, one of the strategies would be local production for local consumption, where agricultural, forestry and fishery products produced in the district is consumed within the district. Specifically, there are efforts such as local agricultural, forestry and fishery products being sold at produce stands and volume retailers, as well as using local agricultural, forestry and fishery products in school lunches and employee cafeterias. As a result, income opportunities are generated for the local producers which increases the fund circulation in the district, as well as having the merit of shrinking the distance between the producers and the consumer, which serves to bring down transportation cost, provide fresh quality produce and foster a fondness for local products.

Local production for local consumption should be considered not only for agricultural, forestry and fishery products but also for energy. Fossil fuel such as gasoline and heating fuel depend on imports, and has to be purchased from outside the district (overseas), making energy a leading item for the spending drain to outside of the district. However, if there are natural resources within the district that can be used as renewable energy, the energy supply within the district can be established by introducing renewable energy and the payments to the outside of the district for energy expenses will decrease, resulting in the circulation of funds within the district.

In addition, by promoting energy-saving efforts, the amount of energy consumption in the district will decrease and make it possible to curtail the drain of payments for energy (spending) to outside of the district. Some ideas for example are promotion of capital investment for energy conserving and decreasing the dependence on cars by forming compact cities.

### c. Diversification of Investment Methods Inside the District

As mentioned above, the funds that do not get spent will be deposited to the financial institution as savings and be reinvested by said financial institutions. However, because investment decisions are entrusted to the financial institutions, even if there is a proposal that is necessary for the district or has business content that holds future possibilities, it may be difficult for the financial institution to take on certain investment opportunities due to problems like business performance and balance of income and expenditures.

In recent years, new investment methods which do not involve financial institutions are beginning to spread. Such methods make it possible to invest in, for example, social businesses $ ^{Note 40} $ which conventional financial institution had difficulty taking on, and has the possibility of contributing to stimulating reinvestment within the district by broadening the base for investment plans. Also, these methods take on the role of widely encouraging social investments by the private sector and donations from citizens to supplement portions that cannot be covered by public funds, for the sake of continued building up of the local community.