Business content
The experience of regional development through Okinawa's own "communal shop" is a wonderful property of Okinawa that can be called a "communal shop model", and I would like to widely publicize the contemporary significance of co-stores and co-shops remaining in various parts of the prefecture. Therefore, while supporting the joint store and the joint store, in order to spread the significance, create a booklet and a map (paper medium, Japanese/English), donate to each joint store and the joint store for free, and sell at each store. .. We would like to provide business support by donating the sales as they are to each store. The data of booklets and maps will be widely disseminated by making them widely available on the website. Also, by creating an English version, it is possible to inform overseas people, including foreign tourists, of the joint shop.
background
There are unique development cases centered on "communal shops" established on the basis of mutual assistance and autonomy of the village communities in the villages in the northern and northern parts of the main island of Okinawa and the islands.
A joint store is a cooperative mutual aid organization centered on purchasing business, and is established by all (or all) the villages invested in and managed by the villages. In the latter half of the Meiji era, it was first born in the back village of Kunigami Village, which is located at the northern end of the main island. In addition to purchasing business, it has realized its own community development, such as living infrastructure development, industrial promotion, education, welfare, and fulfilling private financial functions similar to microcredit.
Many of these villages are in isolated and inconvenient transportation areas, and far from the Ryukyu Imperial Government and the Meiji government at that time, so they have fallen far behind in terms of modernization. Moreover, over the past 100 years, the Ryukyu government, the Meiji government, the US military rule, and the return to Japan have undergone major changes in the political system. Due to their historical and geographical circumstances, they have developed a unique form of mutual aid that cannot be found in other regions of the mainland, nor is it bound by the current Japanese cooperative system.
This voluntary community development experience, the “joint store model”, is being re-evaluated especially in the areas of town development and welfare. In the Ohari area of Marumori town in the southern part of Miyagi prefecture, stores have been established with Oku Joint Store as a model. In Hiroshima prefecture, Kyoto prefecture, Oita prefecture, etc., similar stores with owned and operated by residents are being established one after another. Most of these areas are sparsely populated areas where distribution and services by government and private capital have been stalled, and aging mountainous areas, where the residents themselves voluntarily invest in each other to respond to the problem of “shopping refugees” Are doing business.
These are models of “voluntary” and “participatory” community building by residents, and also “regional development” such as “industrial promotion”, “regional public service hubs”, and “development by local residents”. We believe that this is a regional management model that can be applied not only to Japan but also to developing countries, as it also has the necessary elements to solve the above problem. In addition, especially this year 2012 is also the year of international co-operatives, and researchers and related institutions are showing increasing interest in joint shops in Okinawa.
However, the actual management situation of each store is extremely severe, and the number of joint stores that seemed to have been close to 200 in the past is now about 60, and the number is decreasing year by year. As it is, the very valuable model of local autonomy will be lost, and at the same time, the village life itself will collapse.
Therefore, as activities to support and re-evaluate, 1) Produce a booklet, a map, etc. that introduces the joint store. (2) Donate the completed products to each store and have them sell them to support sales and promote understanding of the significance.
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