Edonomy in Keihoku: Circular Economy in 1,000-year-old sustainable town

After a 40-minutes drive northwest from Kyoto City through the mountainous paths and luscious greens, you will come upon a wide basin where the modest Keihoku Town sits. Greenery sprawls the fields, and the sun lights the scene up, seemingly untouched by time for centuries. Houses gathered in various cozy pockets against the breathtaking backdrop. On the other hand, a newly built school stands proudly on the hill. On the weekend, residents crowd happily into the only supermarket in Keihoku.

Keihoku Town has been around since the Heian Period, meaning that it is more than a thousand years old. Though there are modern facilities in the town, Keihoku also demonstrates how perfectly they have achieved coexistence with their environment. This is one of the many satoyama in Japan, rural villages that have found a way to create a sustainable community and 1,000 years of experience to show for.

As it turns out, there is a reflection of Japan’s model of Circular Economy, Circular Edonomy, here. In this visit to Keihoku, we visit local meisters (“masters” in German) who call Keihoku home and discover a unique element of their sustainable lifestyles: openness.

And to show us around Keihoku is ROOTS, dedicated to promoting the wisdom of satoyama, sustainable rural villages which coexist with nature. ROOTS understands the value of satoyama and hopes to create a network of the world’s sustainable villages. They are stationed at Keihoku, making them the most perceptive of the circular economy model here.

What is Circular Edonomy?

In case you are unfamiliar with the term Circular Edonomy, it is a term coined by Isao Kitabayashi from COS KYOTO. “Circular Edonomy” is Japan’s original model of the Circular Economy. This phrase combines “Economy” and the “Edo Period” of Japan, a circular model that implemented repairing (to fix broken products) and returning (regenerative outcomes for the environment) to full effect.

Although the term borrows the word “Edo,” Edonomy has been a way of life for the Japanese, with roots traced even to a thousand years ago, more than 600 years before the Edo Period. We see Circular Edonomy demonstrated and adapted perfectly on a city level in the Edo Capital (now Kyoto City). Even though the country was closed off during the Edo Period, Edo Capital was the largest city in the world then, with a population of 1 million. Yet, it was able to sustain for more than 200 years.

Circular Edonomy in Keihoku

Tracing where the model originated from, we can see its genesis in satoyama, rural villages in Japan that has achieved coexistence with the surrounding nature. One of the most well-known satoyama in Japan is Keihoku in Kyoto Prefecture. And it is here where we further our education about Edonomy.

We have learned in our previous exploration that a collection of venous businesses have sprung up to repair and collect in the cities, effectively stamping out the existence of waste by turning all into resources. Coexistence with nature was the guiding principle, and thus there was minimal impact on the environment.

Indeed, we saw similar examples of how waste is efficiently minimized and any waste produced is redefined as a resource. Local life and traditions meister, Shigeri Kawarabayashi, showed us the sustainability of the Keihoku lifestyle. Outdoor temperature did not penetrate a 650 year-old kayabuki thatched house, so the indoors did not require coolers or heaters. Buildings were built in a way that was easy to repair. Lowland cascades of rice paddles filtered used water from rain basins, clean and ready to be reused downstream.

Doing sustainability right, doing it for the community

Feilang Tseng from ROOTS invited us to her home, where she shared how people used to gather at her place for periodic events before the coronavirus pandemic began. These events weren’t held solely for education or entertainment. The main drive of holding these events is to hold an activity where the local community can have fun.

“We do not look for big names or celebrities to join the events. Because even if we can say that ‘thanks to someone famous, we were able to attract a large number of people,’ that is not going to sustainable for the community.”

Some of us might struggle with this thinking. Shouldn’t good things be shared with everyone, and we should maximize that happiness? The counterargument would then be: why should we?

This is an essential realization. The capitalistic concept of “more is better, regardless the cost” is problematic. In the context of Keihoku, holding an event too large may bring considerable monetary benefits. But the destructive impact on the surrounding nature and residents will be part of the expense. This sentiment was also echoed in Kyoto’s oversight in overtourism, where the accelerated growth of tourist numbers actually lowered the quality of life for Kyoto residents.

Perhaps we need to embrace concepts like Degrowth to ensure sustainability. The focus of these events is to benefit the community.

Doing the community right, doing it with magokoro

We also visited Sébastien Renauld and Mélanie Heresbach, French architects who moved to Keihoku after discovering the high quality of wood and falling in love with the serenity of the village. They have produced exquisite chairs of function and beauty, and are currently testing new products for durability before releasing them to market. You can see the range of exquisite products on their website, 2M26.

Sébastien joked that he felt a need to make even better products after discovering the high quality of the wood in the region. Similarly, when talking about the relationship the couple first had with the locals, they were surprised that the neighbors came to greet them when they moved in. The norm in Japan is for the new neighbor to make visits to other households to introduce themselves. Furthermore, the locals have very accepting of them. Sébastien felt that he had to return their magokoro.

Magokoro is the word for sincerity in Japanese. Often used as a cliche in advertising, but the feeling is genuine when Sébastien uses it. It is a virtuous cycle, where sincerity begets sincerity, often backed by gratitude. This gratitude reflects in how Sébastien treats nature and the Keihoku community.

The openness in Circular Edonomy

Throughout our experience of Keihoku, one unique dynamic stood out as the motif: a unique openness. We can identify this openness in three different aspects:

1. Openness is sharing skills
2. Openness in inviting neighbours
3. Openness in inviting others to personal lives

Open in sharing knowledge and skills

It would not be strange to expect Kyoto artisans to be the top specialists at their craft. In fact, the city is proud of its centuries-old artisanal skills in various crafts. A business in Kyoto can be decades old, but still considered young in the eyes of Kyoto citizens!

However, we saw how that definition of 1-person-1-skill is challenged in Keihoku. Instead of going to any one artisan to seek their expertise, multiple residents who have the knowledge will come forward to offer share and teach what they know.

Two unique aspects drive this. Living among the community, one will eventually need help from the surrounding neighbors, for example, to build a house. Veterans will come in to assist and, more importantly, teach the necessary skills. This means that the longer one stays in a satoyama, the wider the range of expertise one attains. Therefore, no one is a specialist only in one area, but a Jack-of-all-Trades (of traditional knowledge about sustainability, no less).

Furthermore, this learn-as-you-go process is a satoyama’s way of passing on knowledge. It is knowledge that has been sustained for more than a thousand years in Keihoku. We think this is one of the essential elements in a sustainable city or community, and indeed in Circular Edonomy. We see the same in the Gion Matsuri, where the festival has sustained for more than a millennium. Veterans pass down the vital knowledge of the floats to future generations in their community while adapting to present-day needs.

Open to learn from outside

Part of ROOTS’ mission is to increase the connection between satoyama (including Keihoku) and overseas individuals. They have conducted various programs, including an exchange between Italian and Japanese carpenter meisters, and projects to use Keihoku’s excess lumbers.

Therefore, Keihoku sees a number of overseas visitors throughout the year. Even though the programs have moved online because of the coronavirus pandemic, there is a significant impact on the Keihoku residents.

Through the interaction with people from other countries, the residents have taken a strong outward interest in different cultures. The locals have even started to form multiple interest groups, which include African dance and Tennis. Not quite the typical activities we’d link with rural Japan. The residents take it upon themselves to fund the courses and activities, for example paying dance instructors to come into Keihoku to teach.

We can call it curiosity, but I like to think that ROOTS’ programs have injected an influence of “the world outside” into Keihoku, thus flaming the desire to learn more about other cultures. That desire helps keep the residents open-minded to learn. It manifests itself in them actively initiating bringing in mentors and tutors teach in Keihoku.

By the way, apparently, there is no notice board to promote these interest groups. Most of the activities are promoted by word-of-mouth, which shows how tightly knit the community is.

Openness in circle of trust

“There is no privacy. Everyone knows where you have been with whomever,” a member of ROOTS shared with us. Now, this sounds discomforting and scary. However, this is different from the openness we are talking about in Keihoku. In Keihoku, it refers to the closeness between neighbors, like family members looking out for one another. There is a defining circle of trust that says, “You are one of us.”

No first-time customers: the circle-of-trust filter

Some restaurants in Kyoto have an “ikkensan okotowari” rule, which means “no first-time customers.” It can be surprising to the uninitiated, especially when Kyoto represents the epitome of Japanese hospitality. There is no trace of animosity towards first-timers, to be sure, as the nuance leans towards “recommendation needed.”

There is a similar sense in satoyama, including Keihoku. For a Keihoku resident, being open means offering their community access to their knowledge, time and hospitality. That often means opening up their lives to others, like how Sébastien and Mélanie offer “full openness” to their home and workshop, and Raica Toyama, a local cook who graced us with original and creative meals and her story because we were guests to the Keihoku.

Recommendations of “someone knowing someone” is the best fit for satoyama, especially as a filter to trust. It acts as a pass to achieve “zero-second” trust, allowing the residents to offer their best hospitality from the beginning, to begin sharing without needing to hold back.

While “ikkensan okotowari” originates from matters of payment, it is also one based in the “currency” of trust, and thus a gateway to openness for Keihoku.

Community and Trust drives sustainability for 1,000-year-old

Keihoku is not without its unique set of issues. For example, its population is less than 4,500, about a 900 decrease from five years ago. ROOTS is one of the regional revitalizers attempting to tackle the depopulation problem. Furthermore, the residents are keenly aware of the climate crisis and how it affects lives in Keihoku and worldwide. We need to fix our disconnect with the environment. Like Sébastien shared, designs should be linked with nature, so that we can live in coexistence with nature. Like forestry, if we remain disconnected, the chain of subsistence and coexistence will collapse for both humans and nature.

And coexistence with nature is just the baseline. Keihoku shows us that the bonds of the community and the circularity of trust extend the sustainability of a town. Even after a millennium has passed, Keihoku town continues to offer the wisdom of sustainable coexistence with our environment. Perhaps it goes beyond just about Circular Economy and heads to the heart of what truly matters: the well-being of both the environment and the society.