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Athlete, entrepreneur Carole Fuchs raises awarenessRoundtable
KERRY FURUKAWACONTRIBUTING WRITER

Carole Fuchs is always ready to climb amountain. If she has had a bad day, sheconquers a peak and forgets her worries.
She has climbed Mount Everest, and now
has an ambitious plan to trek the Great
Himalaya Trail at the highest possible
point over Nepal.
Fuchs is a self-described nature lover
who was absorbed by adventure TV programs as a child and went on an expedition to the Sahara Desert when she was 16
years old. Her reason for being enamoredwith the outdoors is simple: It’s natural.
“This is the place I’m the happiest on
Earth, in nature,” she said. “If I’m not innature, I’m just literally dying. So yeah,
I cannot stay in town too long. I thinknature gives me energy.
“Maybe it’s scientifically proven thatwhen you are in the forest, trees andnature release some hormones [so] that
we can just be like in harmony with them,and I really believe this is true, so this is myelement.”
Fuchs sat down with Ross Rowbury at
The Japan Times Sustainable Roundtable
29 on March 16, discussing how her love of
nature has led to lobbying, climate change
activism and advocacy for more sustainability in sports.
During the course of the conversation,
while explaining her journey to Japan,
Fuchs mentioned quite casually that she

had climbed Mount Everest. The Japanesecompany that sponsored her climb later
invited her to work for it in Tokyo. Prodded by Rowbury, she said Everest was
an interesting, though not intimidating,experience.
“Actually, I’m training a lot, so I’m always
more or less ready to go, so this was not sodaunting. But I tried to be the first Frenchwoman to climb it without supplementary oxygen. And this was really stressful.
This was a goal within the goal. So it was
really hard.” She did end up using bottled
oxygen but also suffered eye edema on
the way down due to having gone so long
without it.
Five years after Everest, Fuchs has more
alpine aims, and plans to merge climbs
with raising awareness about climatechange.
“I climbed mostly in the Himalayas andthe highest mountain, so a few 8,000meter peaks, 7,000-meter peaks. So I spent
a lot of time there. And through my own
eyes, and through the eyes of the local
people I was talking to, I noticed the glacier dying, literally, so this is really obvious.
The glacier layers are receding and theavalanches are more frequent,” she said.
“It’s also [evident in] the climbing seasons. For example, Mount Everest: The
climbing season now is a bit confusing, so
you can climb longer. Fifty years ago, theweather window was really like May, justone month. Now you can push a little bit
further. So you have the winter expeditions — more and more people can succeed in climbing the mountain in winter.
Fuchs is a legal
counsel and a policy
manager on climatechange and biodiversity at the British
Embassy, combining
climate action andclimate diplomacy.
YUICO TAIYA

Professional mountain athlete and nature lover Carole Fuchs YUICO TAIYA FOR PHOTOMATE

That was harder back in the day, so theseasons are changing.”
To alert others to these changes in what
she calls a ‘positive way,’ Fuchs wants totravel with a cameraman across the Great
Himalaya Trail. Along the way, she intends
to document the effects that climatechange is having not only on the physicalenvironment, but also on the livelihoodsof people in some of the communities
most vulnerable to its impacts.
“It has to be double-sided. It’s not just a
Western girl going there showing things.
It’s also us interviewing the locals about
what they are thinking, what’s the voice,what they want to raise about theirsituation.”
Fuchs’ goal within the goal this time will
be to become the fastest or one of the fastest women ever to make it across the trail.
Other aspects of her climate activism
include her Green Athletes initiative, inpartnership with the Kyoko-based nonprofit Kiko Network. One objective of the
project is to document athletes’ observations about climate change. The idea isthat as athletes often witness firsthand theeffects of climate change, their voices canhelp raise awareness of the problem.
Additionally, to address the volume ofwaste generated by clothing, Green Athletes is focused on creating sustainable

sportswear. One of Fuchs’ products, which
she wore during the interview, is a T-shirt
made of recycled plastic bottles and bamboo fiber.
“My idea is very simple, actually: justcreating sports clothes made of recycled
and natural elements,” she said. “For example, making a T-shirt like this one. The
textile is made of 50% recycled PET bottles
and 50% of bamboo fiber. Why? Because,
you know, we as athletes like to have technical gear, so the bamboo is actually very
good — it’s breathable but anti-odor, it
doesn’t stink, so it’s great for sports.
“The full picture is like: this T-shirt, you
get it, you buy it, then when it’s damaged
or when you don’t need it anymore, yousend it back. We recycle it and we give youanother T-shirt. The T-shirt never ends up
in the gomi (garbage). Basically, it’s recycled and it just keeps circulating.”
Even in her day job, as policy director
at the British Embassy in Tokyo, Fuchs is
engaged in work to protect nature — her
best friend. Her post involves lobbying
the Japanese government to align someof its climate policies with the U.K. government’s. Fuchs believes government
policies must provide a framework forindividual action against climate change tobe effective.
“Because if we do clean up, we can clean
up all our lives. But if the government is notchanging things like the packaging ending
up in the rivers, it’s like Sisyphus climbing
the mountain with the stone, always falling and just climbing back up. So if we don’t
have the policy, then this is less impactful.”
However, she acknowledged that it is notalways easy to get countries within andoutside the Group of Seven, of which Japanand the U.K. are members, to agree on environmental policies. One factor is countries’
different economic situations, which influences their approaches.
“I think it is very important to constantly
lobby each other, and this is helping us toraise our ambitions as a group (the G7),” sheFuchs founded the Feel fabric and sportswear
startup and the Green Athletes initiative.
YUICO TAIYA

said. “We are, like, constantly kindly saying
to each other, ‘OK, what are you doing inthis field?’ ‘OK, we are doing this, so why
not work together to just improve thesituation?’”Public education about environmental
issues can help people determine what
actions to take. And Fuchs believes the biggest thing she or anyone can do for climatechange is to think. For instance, she used
to commute to Tokyo from Nagano bybicycle, stopping at shops along the very
long journey for food. However, it occurredto her that perhaps there was a more sustainable way to travel daily. Not to mention
that it was very demanding.
“Maybe if I have a vehicle powered bygreen energy, I will be more sustainable,”she said. “The carbon footprint will be lessthan just riding my bike and eating plentyof carbs, and we are talking about sustainable agriculture — how the food is produced, the carbon footprint of food versus
energy. So it’s complicated. We have to
make it like a game. For me,
it’s like a video game: OK, how
can I save my carbon footprint
today?”
Roundtable is a monthly series of Englishlanguage events organizedby The Japan Times Cube.
For more information visit
https://sustainable.japantimes.com/roundtable

Hiroshima forum sees rising need IISE institute kindles ‘guide stars’for business role in global peace for solving global social issues
ESG/SGDs
MAIKO MURAOKACONTRIBUTING WRITER

How can business play a role in peacemaking? This is the question that the Hiroshima
Business Forum for Global Peace has been
asking since its launch in 2013, and theneed for this kind of discussion is increasing
amid the current heightened insecurity ininternational relations.
To pursue the potential of business tohave a greater impact on the creation ofpeace, the fourth Tokyo session of the2022 Hiroshima Business Forum for Global
Peace was held in Kudan House in Tokyo’s
Chiyoda Ward on Feb. 4. The event was
livestreamed for a remote audience as well.
The Japan Times serves as one of the media
sponsors of the event.
A special partner of the event, the Hiroshima Organization for Global Peace(HOPe), is a network consisting of theHiroshima prefectural government and 20
other organizations. It serves as a platform
for research, human resource training, communication of information, communitybuilding and resource accumulation related
to global peace and the abolition of nuclear
weapons.
The president of the organization andHiroshima prefectural Gov. Hidehiko
Yuzaki gave opening remarks in a video
message; other speakers came from thepublic and private sectors as well as academia. About 276 participants joined theevent in person or online.

Some of the participants that joined the forumin person HIROSHIMA FOR GLOBAL PEACE +TOKYO COMMUNITY

Yuzaki touched on the history of theevent and said: “The event held in 2016
received support from professor Philip Kotler, a world authority on modern marketing, who made three recommendations
based on the event that focused on therole of business and marketing in achieving
global peace. The recommendations wereto reduce armaments, to cut the chain of
hatred and to enhance love.”
He said the events in 2018 and 2019 had
invited Jacque Attali, a French economist
and the founder of the nonprofit Positive
Planet, who recommended that the best
way to solve global issues is for people andnations to think about what would benefit
future generations. “The year 2020 was the75th anniversary of the end of World War
II, and our discussion centered around how
to clarify the roles of businesspeople inachieving ‘positive peace’ and take actions,”
Yuzaki said.
He also explained that the Hiroshima
Appeal adopted at the end of the event in
2021 was a starting point for “building backbetter” from the COVID-19 pandemic basedon the idea of “true utilitarianism” — “forone to seek personal gain, one needs tosimultaneously seek to benefit others.” Themain session of the 2022 events was held in
Hiroshima in September, focusing on how
business can prepare for risks and environmental changes while contributing topeacemaking.
Yuzaki stressed that the Group of Sevensummit to be held in Hiroshima in May willserve as a great opportunity for Hiroshima
to gain attention from the entire world andexpressed his hope that it will help increase
the number of partners cooperating inbuilding peace through business.
The Tokyo session consisted of interviews, panel discussions, a pitching session
and a networking session covering topics
such as inequality of opportunity, diversity
and inclusion, responsible supply chains,open innovation, involvement of young
leaders, and solving social issues simultaneously with growing businesses.
Among the speakers were scholars suchas professor Tsutomu Horiuchi at the Tama
University Center for Social Investment,
business leaders such as Ken Shibusawa,
the CEO of Shibusawa and Company Inc.
and the chairperson of Commons AssetManagement Inc., and young leaders

ESG/SDGs
HIROKO NAKATACONTRIBUTING WRITER

Video message by Hiroshima prefectural Gov.
Hidehiko Yuzaki HIROSHIMA FOR GLOBALPEACE + TOKYO COMMUNITY

including members of G7/G20 Youth Japan,
a nonprofit dedicated to providing future
leaders of the country with opportunities
to take part in high-level youth diplomacy.
In the closing remarks, Yoshimitsu Kaji,chairman and chief sustainability development officer at the software company
Cinnamon AI, expressed his delight in finding many speakers and participants fromyoung generations. “No war is not enoughto be called peace. A world free of structural violence is a world that is less likely
to experience conflicts. On this front, there
are many things that businesses can do,”Kaji said, encouraging youths to feel theconnection with peace through working.
He concluded his remarks by saying that
this year’s G7 summit in Hiroshima has significant meaning because three of the G7
nations are nuclear powers.
The 2023 Hiroshima Business Forumfor Global Peace, supported by the United
Nations Institute for Training and Research,
will be held on April 20, ahead of the G7
summit. With Serhii Plokhy, a professor
and the director of the Ukrainian ResearchInstitute at Harvard University, as the keynote speaker, the event will focus on how
international society and business can contribute to peace in the wake of the Russian
invasion of Ukraine.
Aiming to highlight issues
related to a sustainable society, The Japan Times gave
its support to this event by
becoming a media sponsor.

To address increasingly complex issues
amid global uncertainty, new ideas
and innovative solutions are ever more
important.
The NEC group’s Institute for International Socio-Economic Studies (IISE),
which explores new ways of thinking andacting to solve social issues, on Feb. 10
held a forum on potential issues facing theworld and what the institute aims to doabout them.
“We will take a role of thought leadership,” IISE Chairperson Kumi Fujisawa
said in a speech at the start of the forum.
She said the institute will explore whatissues the world must tackle, at the levelof people as well as from a macroeconomic perspective. “We will help society
implement a new framework, a new system and new business with those who
agree with the future grand design we
propose.”Fujisawa told the audience the thinktank’s mission is “illuminating the futurewith the world’s wisdom.” Like the stars
that guided mariners in ancient times,“we would like to show you the way andcreate the future with you by connecting global issues, people’s wisdom andadvancing technologies.”
The forum also featured a topic thatbroadly affects global issues: economic
security. Christopher Johnstone, senioradviser and Japan chair at the Center for
Strategic and International Studies (CSIS),
addressed that in a keynote speech titled“The Essential Partnership: U.S.-Japan
Relations and the Future of the Free andOpen Indo-Pacific.”
Amid rising geopolitical tensions in
the last two years due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, North Korea’s launch ofballistic and cruise missiles, and China’s
large-scale military exercises around Taiwan, Johnstone said the importance of
the U.S. partnership with Japan and otherallies has become stronger. He said conflict with China over Taiwan is possible
but is avoidable if military and economic
deterrence works, making the costs to
China over such a conflict enormous. On

PAGE: 9the economic side,
the U.S. is taking
steps, particularlyin the semiconductor industry,
to strengthen its
capacity at home,make supply chain
resilience a pivotal element of
national and economic security,and protect criticaltechnologies frommoving into China.
“For the governments of Japan andKumi Fujisawa, chairperson of the NEC group’s Institute for Internathe U.S. and othertional Socio-Economic Studies IISE
allies and partners,
the key message is none of us can achievemunicipal governments and all the stakeeconomic security alone,” Johnston said.
holders for city management to introduce“We must find a way to balance deterways of managing business with clear
rence and economic interdependence
purposes and using competent analytic
with China. ... This is, I believe, a fundadata in order to achieve well-being for all
mental challenge that we must advancetheir citizens. The IISE has additionally
together in years to come. But fortunately,
published white papers on digital transour alliances have never been stronger,
formation for governments and support
and we’re well positioned to tackle overfor developing countries.
challenges ahead.”
As for the IISE’s future projects, FujiThe keynote speech was followed bysawa said the institute plans to make allia session with economists discussing theances with think tanks in the U.S., Britain,
outlook for the global economy, in which
ASEAN and elsewhere to conduct joint
U.S. inflation was peaking out, conditions
studies on economic security.
in Europe were better than expected“What we want to value is a global
partly because of a warm winter, andstandpoint, so we want to collaborate
the Japanese economy was expected towith people around the world, share theirstay firm on the back of strong capital
wisdom and technologies, and create aspending.
new global market,” she said.
The forum also had breakout sessions
For example, NEC has advanced techon topics such as carbon neutrality, global
nologies such as digital transformation
health, digital transformation, digitalfor government administration and biohealth, data-driven city management andmetrics for personal identification. “NECsmart cities led by sports.
has great technologies that can be used to
Established in 2000, the IISE wasaddress global issues. We want to further
revamped in April 2022 and now features
coordination to use such technologies toseven themes for its thought leadershipcreate new business and solve societal
activities. As a result, the institute on Feb.
problems at the same time,” Fujisawa said.
6 announced a proposal, in collaboration
with Keio University, to create a market
This section, “Sustainable Japan,” features
to trade as “future carbon reduction credissues related to the environment and aits” the carbon dioxide emissions that presustainable society while highlighting theventing and adapting to natural disasters
satoyama activities of comwould avoid.
panies and other organizaAlso, the institute proposed in January
tions. For more information,a new smart city concept called “purposesee https://sustainable.japandriven city management,” calling ontimes.com