In order to enhance the productivity of AVM $B_{la}$ produced by Streptomyces avermitilis as a secondary metabolite, we established a basic protocol necessary for protoplast fusion with high-producing strains as a fusion partner, and then obtained various kinds offusants by adopting a massive strain-development procedure (a miniaturized strain screening system). An alternative fusion method using UV and/or NTG mutation of protoplasts was developed to screen genetic recombinants without specific selectable markers. In this method, the mutants obtained by protoplast fusion after UV and/or NTG treatment (95% death rate) of the respective fusion partner (protoplasts of the respective mutants resistant against L-isoleucine antimetabolites such as O-methylthreonine and/or azaleucine) were regarded as DNA-recombined protoplast fusants. Notably it was demonstrated that most of the protoplast recombinants obtained by the UV mutation method were able to biosynthesize higher amount of AVM $B_{la}$ , reaching almost three times higher level (almost equal to the industrial productivity), compared to the average AVM Bla amount of the parallel mother strains.