Hello from Japan!

Amy Carmichael reports on her internship, organised through the Living Laboratory for Sustainability, to Tokyo in the summer of 2016.

I'm writing from the Shukkeien Gardens in Hiroshima, taking some time to reflect on my six weeks as a ‘Sustainability Fellow' at the University of Tokyo. After being warmly welcomed by my new colleagues, and being introduced to the work of the Todai Sustainable Campus Project, I was given the freedom to choose what I wanted to work on. I soon learnt that the Japanese understanding of sustainability focused almost exclusively on energy efficiency. UTokyo was making fantastic progress in this regard, cutting its emissions from non-experimental activity by 15% between 2006 and 2012. It seems this change related to the 2011 earthquake and the associated energy shortages which resulted in energy being a much more tangible resource for the Japanese (more tangible than the endless packaging and plastic bags everything comes wrapped in). As a politics student whose interest is in the social change and policy side of sustainability, it was difficult to see how I could contribute to the technical work of replacing machines with more efficient alternatives. A two hour tour of the new air conditioning facilities at the university hospital, in Japanese (which I speak very little of), didn't help things much!

After meeting with the Student Sustainability Committee which was founded last year, I discovered a problem I could help with. The committee had not been set up by participating students and members were unsure about what students could do to promote sustainability issues, especially with so few of them involved. As a former Environment and Ethical Officer of my college, and one of the Sustainability Directors for Clare May Ball, I'd already spent a lot of time thinking about this topic and it was decided that I would conduct a landscape review of best practice of student engagement in sustainability work to help guide the Committee.

Following an inspiring few weeks reading university websites and annual sustainability reports, and societies' Facebook pages, I was full of new ideas and ready to think about what could be applied to the University of Tokyo. To get a better idea of students' interests, motivations and thoughts on sustainability action, I interviewed a series of students who were kind enough to give up an hour of their time.

With first and second year students belonging to neither faculties nor student residences, and no kind of student union, I learnt that initiatives involving competitions or elected representatives would be difficult to organise here. It made me appreciate Cambridge’s college system, both for making university feel more like home so I feel more responsibility for its environmental impact, and for giving students a smaller, more approachable group to organise activity in. In Cambridge I can easily speak to the college staff to influence college policies or to book facilities for events, and I can quickly reach most members of my college by Facebook to encourage them to get involved. Communication with students is much more difficult in UTokyo, where I am told university email lists are only to be used in the case of an earthquake or volcanic eruption!

At the end of my time, I proposed a strategy involving a sustainability induction for new students so everyone is aware of what they can do. The strategy detailed proposals to expand the work of the student committee to include thematic subcommittees such as waste, food, transport and events, giving students the chance to get involved in sustainability through their other interests. I also presented a collection of ideas and plans from my landscape review which students can work from in the future.

I am very grateful for my time here, both as a chance to explore Japan with its wonderful culture and people, and as a space to reflect on mine and others' relationship with our planet. I can't wait to see where the Todai Sustainable Campus Project will take things from here.

Read more about the Living Lab internships and how to apply here.