First Climate Change Adaptation Center in the Chubu Region opens in Aichi Prefecture.

Date of interview	September 14, 2021
Targets	Department of Surveillance and Information, Aichi Environmental Research Center Shogo Watanabe, Director Norihisa Kojima, Senior Researcher Ryoki Matsuda, Assistant Director

Please tell us about Aichi Prefecture’s unique local features and characteristics.

Mr. Watanabe: Bordering the Pacific Ocean, Aichi Prefecture has long sunshine duration, and has been ranked first nationally in the number of residential solar power equipment installations in each of the past 15 years. Aichi is also a leading prefecture in terms of engineering and other industrial activities, and has been ranked first nationally in manufactured goods shipment value and other related metrics for 43 years in a row since 1977. In particular, Aichi has the largest share by far of national automobile and other transport machinery production. In addition, Aichi has significant agricultural production of flowering plants, cabbage, and other crops and also fishery activities including eel and ayu (sweetfish) farming business. The prefecture had a population of approximately 7,550,000 according to the 2020 census, making it the fourth most populated prefecture in Japan.

Please tell us what led to the establishment of Aichi’s Local Climate Change Adaptation Center and its organizational structure.

Mr. Watanabe: Aichi officially recognized on February 22, 2019 that Chapter 5 of the Aichi Global Warming Prevention Strategy 2030 is the prefecture’s climate change adaptation plan as set forth in Article 12 of the Climate Change Adaptation Act. Then on March 22 of the same year, the Aichi Prefectural Climate Change Adaptation Center was established pursuant to Article 13 (1) of the aforementioned Act, which is a first in the Chubu region. This Climate Change Adaptation Center is functioning as the local hub of activities including gathering and provision of information related to climate change impact and adaptation in the prefecture, with the aim of having business operators and prefectural residents realize that climate change adaptation is what each of them is responsible for and implement more rigorous adaptation measures. The Climate Change Adaptation Center has been set up at the Planning and Information Division of the Aichi Environmental Research Center. This decision was made because the Aichi Environmental Research Center had been conducting surveys and research on environmental protection and been collecting and analyzing various other environmental data for years, making it the prime location for operating the Climate Change Adaptation Center. Its staff consists of two full-time employees and myself serving as Manager of the Planning and Information Division. In terms of the prefectural government’s adaptation planning, we revised its previous plan in July 2020 following the establishment of the Climate Change Adaptation Center to further enhance Aichi’s adaptation actions.

How do you ensure proper coordination with other departments of the Prefectural Government?

Mr. Watanabe: While the Global Warming Prevention Division of the Bureau of the Environment at the prefectural government office is facilitating climate change adaptation and global warming prevention activities among prefectural departments based on the prefecture’s adaptation plan, the Climate Change Adaptation Center is helping coordinate those departments’ activities through information sharing and provision.

How do you plan on coordinating with municipalities in the future?

Mr. Matsuda: In FY 2021, we hosted a workshop involving municipal staff members, prefectural employees, and other concerned parties to obtain advice on climate change impact and adaptation. The first workshop was held in August to discuss climate change in general. We are planning a second workshop this November to deliberate on the topics of citizens’ living/urban living. As these events are mostly attended by those from departments whose functions concern the environment, we intend to carefully select discussion topics for a third workshop and optimize event operations to achieve a larger turnout of attendees representing such departments.

We have noticed that your periodical publication entitled The Newsletter of Aichi Local Climate Change Adaptation Center has such impressive content. Could you tell us what your planning process is like and how you manage to organize information so effectively?

Mr. Matsuda: The Newsletter of Aichi Local Climate Change Adaptation Center is our publication, each issue of which comes in the form of an A4-sized one-page assortment of articles covering climate change impact, adaptation, and other related topics. Our editorial goal is to offer the readers a readily digestible coverage of various seasonal topics that might be familiar to them, along with information on changing weather patterns and their effects, how we should adapt to them, etc. Since the inception of the Local Climate Change Adaptation Center, we have been issuing the publication every month for broad distribution to prefectural residents and business operators.
Since it is a monthly publication, we have been carefully selecting topics that are relevant to each season and been organizing information scrupulously. For example, in the June 2021 edition, we included an article to alert the readers’ attention to risks associated with the heavy precipitation that would typically occur during the rainy season, while the July edition featured an article about heat stroke alerts.

Mr. Watanabe: We have also been publishing related information in the environmental newsletter entitled Kankyo Kawaraban (environmental bulletin), which is issued monthly by Aichi Prefecture’s Bureau of the Environment, and its back issues from the previous year are also made available on the official website of the Climate Change Adaptation Center. this Kankyo Kawaraban has celebrated its 25th anniversary of its first publication, and its 300th issue was recently released. As you can see, we have been engaged in such environmental activities for quite a long time knowing full well that the improvement of public awareness and education would be the key.

Please tell us about Aichi Prefecture’s activities in connection with the Ministry of the Environment’s Climate Change Information Collection and Analysis Project by Public Participation.

Mr. Kojima: We are in the third year of conducting the project contracted by the Ministry of the Environment. Our activities in FY 2019 involved surveying of prefectural residents and business operators to determine how much they knew about climate change and what kinds of effects were being felt in their daily lives, analysis of survey data, and provision of feedback to promote the public’s understanding of climate change manifesting in our local communities. As far as the Climate Change Adaptation Center is concerned, we believe their low awareness of climate change adaptation is an issue. In the questionnaire survey, nearly 60% of the respondents had little to no awareness of the concept. After coming to the stark realization that it would be crucial for us to improve public awareness and education along with the facilitation of climate change adaptation, we will continue with our activities as I have just described.
In FY 2020, we carefully reviewed the survey data obtained in the initial year concerning the effects of climate change that were regularly felt by prefectural residents, and determined which ones should be prioritized for addressing in our local communities. We then formulated a plan of meticulous information gathering and future risk prediction.
In this fiscal year going on the third year of the project, we intend to improve the plan that was formulated in the previous year, predict future hyperthermia incidence trends, examine and organize thoughts on what adaptation measures might be suitable for addressing extreme heat conditions, and facilitate adaptation measure implementation. When summer rolls around in Aichi each year, the prefecture’s meteorological tendency manifests, where the hot humid winds from the Suzuka Mountains in Mie Prefecture, etc. travel down into the Nobi Plain and raise temperatures considerably. As global warming progresses, we believe the need for us to better adapt to extreme heat conditions will increase.
So we are planning to communicate to the public our findings from this three-year project period with the aim of suppressing hyperthermia cases and facilitating adaptation measure implementation, while continuously improving our local adaptation plan.

As you are in the third year of predicting future climate change impacts, please tell us how you are approaching the task.

Mr. Kojima: While climate change has its wide-ranging effects, the more your narrow them down to study them, the more specialized the process increasingly becomes, for example, by focusing on how to alleviate extreme heat conditions, or to prevent hyperthermia, etc. So no matter what we choose to focus on, we need to have access to experts’ knowledge and insights as we handle the task, so we are doing just that.
In order for us to better understand and address various climate change risks in the future, it will be crucial for us to not only gather information properly but also continuously and systematically build a reservoir of relevant know-how at the Climate Change Adaptation Center. As this project that we are involved in, which was first proposed to us by the national government, is allowing us to improve our capacity so significantly, we are grateful for the opportunity.

Please tell us about your future outlook and plans.

Mr. Watanabe: As the previous building where the Aichi Environmental Research Center was located had to be reconstructed, we relocated to the Aichi Environmental Learning Plaza that has state-of-the-art equipment and facilities and reopened in April 2020. Since this move, we have been contemplating new and better ways to run our operations, as intend to provide learning support related to climate change adaptation in addition to our preexisting functions.
The Environmental Learning Plaza has exhibition and video viewing areas that are full of ideas and gimmicks that promote environmental learning including SDGs, involving hands-on exhibits, tablet computers displaying videos, etc. Our current exhibition also features programs and contents that are designed to encourage the visitors to adopt more ecological behavior and improve their knowledge on climate change adaptation. In addition, we offer environmental learning classes where the participants make crafts using recycled materials, and conduct various experiments, etc. The instructors that teach these classes are called “Aichi eco teachers” many of whom are middle- to senior-aged competent individuals passionate about the cause. There are about 30 eco teachers registered with us at the moment.

Finally, please tell us what motivates you to do your work involving climate change adaptation.

Mr. Watanabe: This being the third year of the Climate Change Adaptation Center in operation, we have been focusing on the tasks of diverse information gathering and public communication. While our staff members need to exert significant efforts to issue The Newsletter of Aichi Local Climate Change Adaptation Center every month, the process that requires each one of us to research, learn, and communicate on our own initiative has apparently allowed us to grow as an organization.

Mr. Kojima: It is expected that the impact of climate change will continue to escalate regardless of what the magnitude may turn out to be. Therefore, the role that our Center plays in the promotion of public awareness and education related to climate change adaptation will likely become more crucial heading into the future. So I am motivated by this fact that my job is of such high importance.
Another aspect of my job that drives me is the broad range of the effects of climate change, due to which I get to learn about diverse issues in a whole host of areas. As I think the goal of all climate change adaptation is the maintenance of prefectural residents’ comfortable living, I am intent on continuously gathering useful information and providing it to them in an easy-to-understand manner.

Mr. Matsuda: When I was still a graduate student, my research required me to deal with different climate and atmospheric chemical transport models, and I also had an opportunity to use the supercomputer at the National Institute for Environmental Studies. So I am eager to continuously apply my knowledge and skills that I gained from such research experience in meteorology and climatology to the job that I perform at the Climate Change Adaptation Center.