What is your reaction when you hear the word “doughnut”? Probably “Yum,” right? Along with that starch and sugar, even its roundness is satisfying. What about the term “Doughnut Economics”? Suddenly it doesn’t sound so tasty, but as a guide to re...
You are surely familiar with the old 3 Rs of reduce, reuse and recycle. More modern takes on how to achieve a circular economy stretch as far as 10 Rs and include the concept of “refuse.” While it may be easy enough to refuse by deciding to not buy...
The COP27 climate conference is already underway in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. Before we delve into what we can expect from it, let’s look back at last year’s COP26 and why it ended up being widely criticized as non-inclusive and superficial. COP26...
Japan’s food system is highly dependent on imports and has a self-sufficiency ratio of just 38% on a caloric basis. On top of this, Japanese households on average throw away almost 40% of edible food. Shifting Japan’s food system to a more circular...
Like other countries, fast fashion in Japan is testing the balance between people’s love of fashion and their commitment to protecting the environment. Known for being highly fashion conscious, the Japanese public is also viewed as having a...
If you do an internet search for Japan’s plastic recycling rate, you will find an impressive figure of around 85% (as of 2019). Those of us who live here can pat ourselves on the back for the efforts we make in recycling the PET bottles of green tea...
The climate crisis is an ongoing threat to global peace and security that is expected to worsen in the near future. To reduce its damage to our lives as much as possible, we need to take bold action ― we need a revolution. The power of youths has a...
Japan is one of the nations that says it will use carbon offsetting to achieve its greenhouse gas emissions reduction target. But will that approach really help the world achieve its common goal of halting climate change? What is carbon offsetting...
Outside the supermarket today, a woman greeted me in the desperate way we have all been greeting each other this summer, whether friend or stranger; “Hot, isn’t it?” The weather report now talks not just about “mid-summer days,” but about...
What is sustainable travel? We use the word “sustainability” a lot, but can you define it? It’s not easy, is it? The United Nations defines sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to...