自己組織化マップによる水産物の地域ブランドの分析と評価

Strategy for regional branding becomes pivotal issues as it is widely recognized that regional branding opens routes to give favorable values to regional resources including products and services in certain areas. Previously, we have analyzed the developmental position on the regional brand of services in areas with hot springs as an example by taking advantages of a torus self-organizing map（SOM） algorithm, demonstrating that SOM was a viable tool for evaluation of the regional brand. In the present paper we have focused on row fishery products, and examined whether SOM is applicable in this case. The analysis was performed for 17 regional brands ranging from already famous ones （Seki saba, Ohma maguro etc.） to less developed ones （Tottori hatahata, Wakkanai onago etc.） with factors of 19 categories determining the values of the brands. The two-dimensional torus SOM expressed that each factor affected the positions of the brands, indicating usefulness of SOM for regional branding strategy. As a conclusion, strength and stability of the brands are decided by factors in the basic values, one of the three values constituting the total value of the brands, while other two values, information and indirect ones, give uniqueness to the brands.