Narrator: 2025 has been dubbed the Ocean Super Year, and various ocean related events are being held.
Beginning in April, the World Expo 2025 Osaka Kansai is being held over six months with the theme of “Designing Future Society For Our Lives.” One of its highlights, the Blue Ocean Dome, has attracted the attention of visitors from all over the world, including exhibits that show the movement of world currents and display ocean-related environmental issues on a spherical monitor.
In June, the United Nations Ocean Conference was held in Nice, France, where an international framework for ocean conservation was discussed. Several great. On June 11th, a side event was held live from Nice and Osaka, where international experts and Japanese government officials discussed what is needed to achieve a sustainable ocean.
“We have engaged in deep discussions.”
In addition, international rules for the sustainable use of the oceans in areas not under the jurisdiction of any country will come into force in June. And in August, there are consultations on regulating plastics which cause marine pollution. In September, multilateral rules for protecting fisheries resources from overfishing are scheduled to come into force. Rules for the mining of mineral resources from the seabed are expected to be adopted by the end of the year.
These are examples of a number of important agreements regarding the oceans scheduled during 2025.
Blue Economy: Views from Japan.
Host: Hello, I'm Jackie Enzmann and I'll be your host. The year 2025 has been called an ocean super year, year in which many international regulations concerning the ocean are expected to be established. That's why I'd like to discuss the keyword “blue economy,” an essential concept when discussing ocean related issues, together with Dr Sunami Atsushi, president of the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, which is actively working to address a wide range of ocean challenges.
Hello Dr. Sunami.
Dr. Sunami: Hi. How are you?
Host: Doing well. Thank you for joining us.
Dr. Sunami: Thank you.
Host: This has been a year when progress has been made across all areas, from curbing excessive use of ocean resources in fisheries and development, as well as establishing global rules for ocean governance.
Dr. Sunami: Well, as we saw in this gathering of the UN Ocean Conference, which is the most the high-level gathering convened by the United Nations and this is, well, the first meeting of the UN Ocean Conference was in 2017 in New York, and then followed by 2022, in Lisbon.
And, so this is, you can see, 2025, to really, to review the progress of SDG number 14, which is life below water. And, as we know that the SDGs, it's a goal that we need to achieve by 2030. So, we only have five more years to go.
So this was a very important time for all of us to get together in Nice to really, see where we are in the moment and evaluate our situation in the year 2025, and looking ahead from the last five years of achieving SDGs, number 14.
Host: So I'd like to talk about the theme for our program today, which is the blue economy. How is this phrase different from other existing terms like ocean economy or maritime economy?
Dr. Sunami: Well, the blue economy's key concept is sustainability. That's why it gathers so much attention globally today because we are facing the tremendous crisis of ocean resources, because of both the from climate change and climate crisis and others, which makes the ecosystem surrounding the ocean is in danger.
So we have to consider the way to balance both economic development and sustainability. So this is why the blue economy sort of combines both two sides of two of the coin together to make it, sort of co-benefit for both economic growth and also sustainability and for the livelihood and ecosystem of the ocean.
Host: How has that been approached in Japan?
Dr. Sunami: Well, of course, we have, our own sort of concept, very similar to blue economy. We call it Umigyou, which, kind of based on the Japanese traditional, sort of, management and a way of thinking of, first starting with our fisheries. But, with the idea of, changing fisheries into more sustainable and much broader sense of blue economy and really addresses some of the key unique Japanese questions about, challenges about ocean management.
Host: I think Umigyou is a Japanese word. So I wonder if you could tell us the parts about what Umigyou means as well.
Dr. Sunami: Well, gyou is about, a sort of, broadly speaking, more and economic activities of things. We can have a different sort of professional economic activities surrounding, different sectors and so on and so forth.
But umi is the ocean, literally, and it's the word that covers the sort of economic activities utilizing the marine ocean resources.
Host: I see. Let's take a closer look at what Umigyou in Japan is all about.
Narrator: Miura City is the birthplace of the term Umigyou. Located at the entrance to Tokyo Bay, it offers easy access to both the open sea and the major consumer market of Tokyo, and thrived as a hub for frozen tuna from deep sea fishing.
However, in the 1980s, tuna catches began to decline. At the same time, advancements in freezing technology and improvements in transportation networks reduced Miura’s geographic advantage, causing the city to lose its competitiveness with other frozen tuna sites.
Mirua City focused on its fisheries and worked to connect them with a wide range of other sectors, including food processing, tourism, agriculture and education.
Host: I heard that the original Umigyou concept also included plans to open a hotel. At the same time, opposition arose because there were worries that this was too risky for a for a public organization to finance. However, more recently I've heard that there are again plans to build a new resort using private funding. Can you talk a little bit about this?
Dr. Sunami: Well, you can see how Miura city's effort for Umigyou created an increase of tourists coming into the city. Now, you can sort of imagine that even building some sort of a resort, that would encourage to accept more tourists to this city as you see.
So if you think about if you have a plan that doesn't have the actual numbers that sort of support your business plan, it will be, of course, that difficult to how who's going to finance this or who is going to take responsibility if that doesn't work out as it is planned?
So, first, because Umigyou successfully took off and you see the increased number of tourists coming to Miura, and then you can imagine what sort of, then that kind of tourists. Now, you want to gather more by building a resort, which is really cater to have more, high end or other global tourists coming to Miura in the next phase of the development.
But, this needs to be, as you can see, that, in the case of Miura, it's sort of started off with a crisis, sense of crisis by facing the decline of the traditional fisheries and the fishermen and the community there around the fisheries, finally got together to think of other ways of where how to survive, how to develop the city beyond the traditional fisheries.
So which really, created a sense of community that expanded, including other stakeholders, like a tourists, tourism, like the education or local community that have shops and other, businesses other than traditional fisheries, to come together to think about Miura using the economic development model in a sustainable way so that and utilizing that their resources provided by the ocean.
So this is, sort of, focused and well-studied, model of Umigyou in Japan at this moment.
Host: In another area of Japan, a unique approach has been used to revitalize a region leveraging the charm of the sea. Let's take a look.
Narrator: The Seto Inland Sea is surrounded by the regions of Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu. This calm sea is home to over 3000 islands and is renowned for its delicious seafood and mild climate.
Takamatsu City is home to a port that has flourished since the 16th century, serving as the gateway to Shikoku and the islands of the Seto Inland Sea.
One island, located about 50 minutes by ferry from Takamatsu, has recently been gaining worldwide attention.
Tourist: “We love it. I mean, it's beautiful, all the artwork, the modern parts, but with the old parts I think is really beautiful.”
“Yeah, it's really beautiful.”
Narrator: Naoshima, known as a holy land of art, is visited by tourists from around the world.
Tourist: “I'm an artist in Germany and a colleague of mine visits Naoshima for I think eight years. She came back and told me and she say, if you come to Japan, you have to visit Naoshima. It's a very nice place in nature, in art. And so I am here, we are here.
Narrator: Naoshima once prospered through its copper smelting and fishing industries. But the island wasn't immune to waves of time and population decline. In 1985, the mayor of Naoshima connected with an entrepreneur running an education business in a nearby town along the Seto Inland Sea. This was the turning point that sparked Naoshima’s turn toward cultural development and revitalizing the region through art.
A distinctive feature of the island's culture is that it utilizes the entire island as an art site, creating a space where nature and art coexist. Site-specific artwork that blend with the landscape, such as this facility that is both a hotel and art museum, and the world famous Red Pumpkin by Kusama Yayoi, are major attractions.
Souvenir shops bustle with tourists looking for local specialties from the Seto Inland Sea region. As a result of local revitalization through art, real estate has risen in value and more people are moving to the area, boosting the local economy.
Host: So the Setouichi Triennale Art Festival, which has been held since 2010, has grown into a large scale event that involves not only Naoshima, but also the surrounding islands.
Additionally, I've heard that the islands themselves are working to establish a Setouchi brand that will brand not only the islands, but also their coastal specialty products as well.
Dr. Sunami: Well, what makes Naoshima and this Setouchi model unique is that it exemplifies the sort of a combination of or convergence of art, architecture and nature, which gives us tremendous beauty from the Setouchi, the thousand islands.
And also with the local revitalization, this is a key, right? Because it's not just the art and architecture in nature, but also it really brings in the new way of thinking about the local revitalization.
Host: And the fact that these islands have traditionally been so remote, has preserved them in a way, it almost has become an additional charming point about the islands. The fact that they are so separate from kind of the big city life that maybe people know in Japan.
Dr. Sunami: Some of the islands are now being deserted. Nobody lives there who created a very unique ecosystem. That island itself has no, you know, sort of, since it's sort of preserved that nature as itself. And we have so many of islands like that in the center, which we're now. It's to use it, using it as a way of, appreciating the nature itself by connecting these islands that had been already deserted there with nobody lives living.
And which created additional, new value. And so it's really turned around from an area where, sort of declining of the traditional, industries, manufacturing and others and onto a new sustainable blue economy model. And this is a very unique example in Japan.
Host: Let's take a look at activities focused on the future.
Narrator: In this marine education session for children, they observe marine life, cultivate aquatic plants and pick up trash, on the beaches of their hometown.
Hannan City is located in southern Osaka, not far from Kansai International Airport, the gateway to Osaka. Surrounded by sea and mountains, it has a thriving fishing industry.
Known as the cradle of the sea are rare eelgrass beds along the coast, which are declining nationwide. This type of seaweed is vital to the fishing industry. It serves as spawning grounds for fish and shellfish to lay their eggs and helps improve water quality.
The local children play a major role in conserving these eelgrass beds. As part of their marine education, they are actively involved in conservation efforts and over the five years leading up to 2023, the size of the eelgrass beds has nearly doubled.
Host: Dr. Sunami, can you talk about why this initiative is focusing on eelgrass specifically?
Dr. Sunami: Well, we used to go and swimming, and the eelgrass was always there to bother us because it's really it was a kind of a part of the Japanese coastal sea, to have the eelgrass. And that creates a sort of a home for, small fish that comes in then, you know, and it gives the diversity, the home ground for the diversity of the Japanese coastal area.
And, eelgrass over the years, throughout the process of industrialization in Japan, most of them just start to disappear. And, the fishermen didn't at first realize there's the relationship with the eelgrass that has been disappearing and also the declining of the fish catch that they're getting over the years.
And so they connect the two together. Now, they’re thinking that if we can restore the eelgrass as it used to be, and then can we bring back the that fish catch like before, before the industrialization and of course the pollution and all the other factors that went into the Japanese coastal areas.
Host: And eelgrass also has a special role to play when it comes to absorbing CO2.
Dr. Sunami: So seagrass in general, it's a plant underwater like a mangrove and seagrass and wetlands there in the coastal areas that, were considered to have a, some sort of a role in, carbon sinks and observing the, CO2 and, looking at the, for Japan's case, we don't have much mangroves, unlike the, you know, southern, other part of the world.
But in Japan, we have a lot of seagrass and eelgrass. So, we focus on this particular aspect of blue carbon to really also create the co-benefits of not only bringing back the fisheries that we used to have, but also a way to contribute to carbon sequestration.
Narrator: The eelgrass beds in Hannan City have been certified under the J-Blue Credit system for their CO2 absorption volume, which is authorized by the Japanese Ministry of Land, infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.
J-Blue Credit is Japan's unique blue carbon credit system that quantifies the CO2 absorbed and stored by marine and coastal ecosystems, allowing it to be traded for credits.
Host: This was a perfect example of how these sustainability efforts to make local fishing sustainable also at the same time had the impact of global sustainability as well.
Dr. Sunami: And one of the other unique point about Japan's effort is that Japan is, particularly in the coastal regions, facing natural disasters. And the way of preserving this blue carbon or the blue economy, is a way of us creating coastal resilience against storm surges or any erosions that happens in Japan.
So this could be a very interesting model for rest of that other part of the world that faces a similar, natural disaster crisis.
And so we, not only trying to use Umigyou in a way to to see this is a unique Japanese example of blue economy, but also it all can be applicable to our area of the world that is, facing similar challenges from natural disasters and erosions and storms and so on and so forth is a way to not only co-benefiting, not only, sustainably, sustainable ecosystems, but also both economic development, but also the protection from natural disasters.
Outro: That wraps up our rebroadcast of the special program, “Blue Economy in the Ocean Super Year 2025.” The full version includes some excellent visuals, so I’d encourage you to head over to the show notes for links to the video version on SPF’s YouTube channel. Part 2 of this series, which will look to the potential of the blue economy for countries in Africa, is coming soon, so stay tuned.
Thanks for listening to SPF World Views. We’ll see you next time.