SEGO Initiative

Join us for Japan’s largest Climate Fresk! SEGO Initiative is excited to support the organization of the largest Climate Fresk workshop ever held in Japan. This unique event, organized by Ichigo Bloom, UTokyo GXSN and クライメートフレスク - Climate Fresk Japan will be held on Sunday 10th November afternoon at the University of Tokyo. We invite all our community members to participate in this fun and educational workshop about climate change. You can find more information and register on the event’s official page: https://lnkd.in/gHauva_7 日本語　https://lnkd.in/ddaFfzf4

On October 6, we hosted our International Coastal Cleanup, part of Ocean Conservancy's annual campaign. For our 15th anniversary, the cleanup was an intimate affair for invited corporate volunteers and families. 6:00 am, on the day, the SEGO Sunrise team did the early morning set up - tents, banner, flags, tools, water refill spot, art and tables on Kugenuma Kaigan. Fifty volunteers joined us at our HQ, located one minute from Kugenuma Kaigan Station, for a light breakfast. After, everyone went off to the beach for a warm up, leader orientation and cleanup. In the end, 40 bags of debris ( 20 burnable, 20 non burnable) were removed. The collection included a total of 4750 items. The top 3 were: 1050 cigarette butts, 1760 foam pieces, 788 plastic bags (pieces or whole.) Then everyone was treated to an aperitif lunch buffet back at HQ aka Soleil Provence French Language School! For this cleanup, we also joined hands with groups across Japan (Okinawa and Miyazaki) and the ocean (Toronto and Nice). Many,many thanks to our volunteers and supporters ! Kevin Parrington Allan Wooding Thomas BERTIN Aston Bridgman Arjuna Kumarasuriyar Dai Kato Ken Moroi and so many more! Photos by Minoru Nitta.

Time flies as we look back at the last couple of months! June: the Sea to Summit UN World Oceans Day event co-hosted with the Embassy of Canada | Ambassade du Canada in Japan. April: we hosted our Art By The Beach exhibition, an Earth Day Cleanup with a special guest from Ocean Conservancy, and an on-site "Healthy Soils Healthy Seas" Corporate Composting Workshop . There's more to come this Fall with the International Coastal Cleanup. Our mission started 15 years ago so to supporters, artists, interns, volunteers, and cheerleaders: "Many, many thanks! "

34 million pounds of marine debris: collected and removed! Launched by YouTube creators, Mark Rober and MrBeast, Team Seas involved a massive global cleanup movement with Ocean Conservancy and the Ocean Cleanup Project. We were happy to make our tiny contribution to the huge Team Seas x Ocean Conservancy mission. Our Team Seas Japan took us to beautiful, rural coastal areas and islands in Seto Inland Sea, Tohoku and Hokkaido, with so much potential for social impact voluntourism (volunteering + tourism). Stay tuned for more on that later!

As the sun sets today on the Marine Day (海の日), it marks the true start of summer beach holidays, especially in our area. Originally Marine Memorial Day, the third Monday in July became an official part of the Happy Monday scheme and was transformed into a holiday in 2003. The purpose is to" express gratitude for the blessings of the sea and wish for the prosperity of Japan as a maritime nation." In addition, July 1~31st is considered to be Ocean Month. So we continue to focus on exploring our connections to the sea and to each other. We'll start with a look back at our June 7 Sea to Summit UN World Oceans Day, followed by plans for the present and upcoming ones for the future. Stay tuned for more! And thank you for your support! Photo credit : Photo by Raphael Lopes on Unsplash #uminohi #marineday #oceanconservation #oceanstewardship #oceanliteracy #oceanplastic #corporatevolunteering #corporatecitizenship #unsdgs #sustainability #csr

With Canada Day celebrated yesterday onJuly 1, here is another lingering q&a from our June 7 Sea to Summit UN World Oceans Day event : Why did the Embassy of Canada | Ambassade du Canada in Japan co-host the event? What’s the connection? Back in 1992 (June 8), Canada proposed the concept of the World Oceans Day during the Earth Summit, United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, in Rio. It was during the NGO Global Forum of the Earth Summit with a goal to raise awareness of importance of the ocean to the planet and to us, and it was the start of a movement around public education and ocean literacy. This year, in Canada, July 1st , was marked with summer weather, parades and long weekend. But for the Small Island Developing States of the southern Caribbean, July 1st marked the fastest and earliest Category 5 storm as Hurricane Beryl formed and ripped through places like Barbados, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, St Lucia… Temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean are warmer now than in the usual September peak of hurricane season …. Photo credit #ShowYourStripes visual showing the warming of global oceans...we're in the red zone...

Another one in the series of feedback and q&a from our June 7 Sea to Summit UN Oceans Day event What are some of the “Out of sight Out of mind” connections and challenges facing the ocean? Breaking Through the Noise- Are you listening? It is funny how just close the ocean is if you stop and think. 90% of all global commerce- the movement of goods- occurs on the water through shipping .  On any given day, there are more than 50000 plying the oceans- shipping containers and containers. Everything in our world ( human world) evolves because of it. And how does this ー this soundscape - affect the ocean. This noise from which there is little escape. Sound travels 3 times faster in water than on land, and is an efficient way to navigate the undersea world where light seldom penetrates but where there is an abundance of life. We are familiar with the images of sea's surface. But light diminishes at from about 100m deep as hues of blue and indigo change to black. Whales and other species navigate both the light and the dark of the deep sea. Their songs are their communication channels. Sound travel three times faster in water. Over the years, they have changed the pitch of their songs to overcome the cacophony of human-induced noises- engines, blasts, mining, construction, turbines. Simply put, our noise disrupts their concord and peace as they try to communicate over pandemonium . It’s like trying to talk in a loud party or on a busy highway. Only male fin whales can sing as loud as ships with their hums traveling more than 1000 km under the water… Natural ocean seasonal noises… But noise and sounds can be used as invitations to rewild. Take the 4th largest coral bleaching event that is happening as we write. The warming waters due to successive marine heat waves mean that we are losing our aquatic gardens - Kelp, coral reefs- the nurseries for fish, and other mammals, and natural protection for coastal areas. Sounds are a promising to remedy the situation.   https://lnkd.in/gzTVSW2W How do you break through the noise ?

Celestial events : June 21: Summer Solstice 夏至 and June 22 Strawberry Moon What effects do the summer solstice- the longest day of the year- and following strawberry moon have on the ocean and on us? Well for one, bigger tides. During the solstice, the sun's gravitational pull on the earth is at its apex as it is closest to the equator. And during the first full moon of summer, the moon's gravitational pull on the earth is at its highest. The moon on June 22 is a strawberry moon So expect great tides!

Recent news about the state of thickness of ice in the Hudson Bay Area ( Canada) seems to be "out of sight, out of mind" as we hit high humidity in Japan- but also a harbinger of what we could expect in the future. What happens to ice and its wildlife and people, happens to the coast as well. The eco-system is connected and interdependent. Polar bears need at least 10cm of thick ice to hunt and survive. They do not hunt when there is no ice. And they could become extinct within our lifetime. "If the world were to breach the U.N. Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures, the research suggests polar bears in Western Hudson Bay and Southern Hudson Bay would be in serious trouble. Under current emissions policies, the world is on track to surpass 1.5 C of warming in the 2030s."

As World Oceans Month continues, here is the first in a series of Q&A from our Sea to Summit UN World Oceans Day held on June 7. "A Talk about glaciers on UN World Oceans Day?" At first glance, it might seem like a moment of disconnect. Normally on Oceans Day, we speak only about the sea. But this year, we decided to explore the ocean in all its forms so that we could see the central role it plays in our lives, no matter where we are. The less obvious interdependence of glaciers and oceans served to awaken curiosity about our aquatic world, the true blue heart of our planet, its central nervous and circulatory system. Glaciers and oceans are part of that fragile interdependent, interconnected system. The ocean, the world's thermal conveyor belt, transfers heat and cold across the planet. Covering over two-thirds of the earth, it already absorbs 90% of the heat. Basically, we'd bake without it. Snow and ice also have a role to play. While being our fresh water reserves, they also serve to reflect heat back to the atmosphere. But melting glaciers and ice sheets release that water to the world's oceans and account for 25% + of sea level rise. This fresh water contributes to changing sea water density, thus affecting how the marine conveyor belt works. And as heat distribution varies, so do weather patterns. In a continued domino effect, unstable temperatures mean a larger difference encountered in the upper and lower layers of the jet stream. This in turn causes increased episodes of clear-air turbulence like that recently experienced by Singapore airlines. Photo credit: Hisa Matsumura #unworldoceansday #worldoceansmonth #seatosummit #climatechange #oceansandglaciers #turbulence