Recently, many researches on the biomass of the agricultural and livestock wastes are being conducted in several respects. The use of biomass is of benefit to the curtailment of oil import, environmental pollution decrease, global warming mitigation and so on. And, in the agricultural sphere, making use of agricultural byproducts can contribute to the revitalization of the agricultural industry and rural community. In other words, making new products or energy by using biomass have a possibility to be developed as a new industry. The industry can create new businesses and job opportunities for rural dwellers. Also, major 3 positive effects of market formation for the agricultural wastes, increase of the idle land use and creation of the new business are expected. However, the use of biomass may be difficult to secure a proper right as a market good in the autonomic market economy. It is necessary to establish or amend related laws or systematic tools for the revitalization of the biomass use. Also, it is required for the government to bear partial costs of the facilities and others in the beginning stage.

Crop inputs in excess of the yield potential of the soil type reduce profitability and increase pollution problems from leaching and runoff. Inaccurate fertilizer and pesticide application can also result in profit loss. Current farming practices plan only for the dominate soil in the field. A government-supported program titled “Pilot village project for the environment-friendly agriculture” was proceeded from 1999 to 2001 to tackle the problems with which our agriculture is faced by introducing IPM, INM and others. The objective of this study is to consider the potential input savings of agricultural chemicals and economic feasibility of the project compared with the conventional farming. The results of the analysis indicate the followings: (1) organic or no-pesticide farming size was increased from 9% in 1999 to 20% in 2001; (2) crop yield was a little bit lower than that of the conventional farming, but the sale price, gross income and income of the pilot village were 6%, 10% and 9% higher than that of the conventional farming, respectively ; and (3) fertilizer and pesticide use also showed decreasing trend gradually.

Recently, together with consumers’ increasing concerns on food safety and environmental issues, there is increasing demand on the environmentally friendly agricultural products such as organic products. At present, Japan, as a biggest net importing country of the agricultural products, is a market of the international-scale in the organic product marketing. Also, it is expected that the possibility of market expansion in the future is very high. According to the 2000 agricultural census in Japan, the number of the environment-friendly agricultural farmers were 501.556 householders. This number is about 145 percent higher than that of the 1996 results of 204,600 householders. Organic products in Japan were mainly marketed through the producer and consumer cooperation, producers" cooperation, specialized marketing company etc. However, along with the department store, big supermarket and others" participation in the market recently, the marketing channels are diversified. As of October 1999, market sales of the organic products were estimated about 350 billion yen. It is expected that organic certification system, organic products import, resturant industry scale and others will be more influential factors on the market expansion of the organic products in the future.