Nippon Foundation

Nippon Foundation headquarters in Akasaka, Tokyo

The Nippon Foundation (日本財団, Nipponzaidan^?) (Tokyo, Japan) is a private, non-profit grant-making organization. It was established in 1962 by the late statesman and businessman Ryoichi Sasakawa to direct Japanese motorboat racing revenue into philanthropic activities. The Foundation’s overall objectives include global maritime development and assistance for humanitarian work, both at home and abroad. In the humanitarian field, it focuses on such fields as social welfare, public health, and education.

History

Leadership

• 1962 – 1995 Ryoichi Sasakawa: businessman, politician, philanthropist
• 1996 – 2005 Ayako Sono: Novelist
• 2005 – Present Yohei Sasakawa: WHO Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination, Japan's Ambassador for the Human Rights of People Affected by Leprosy

Examples of Major Initiatives

• 1962-1970

In 1962, The Nippon Foundation was established under the auspices of the Japanese Motorboat Racing Law. The law and the foundation were initiatives of Ryoichi Sasakawa who, as chair, used them to both help rebuild the Japanese shipbuilding sector, and to conduct philanthropic activities around the world. This system of using gambling revenue to provide aid to needy sectors was a novel one in Japan at that time, and came under intense scrutiny. In response, the foundation strove for transparency^[1] in conducting its activities, making its records publicly accessible from its earliest days.

Initiatives pursued in this period include research for the development of super tankers and their engines, direct support for the shipbuilding industry, and the protection of safety in the Strait of Malacca—vital to Japan’s national security, due to the fact that more than 80 percent of her oil passes this way.

In the field of public welfare, the foundation pursued such youth-oriented initiatives as the building of sports facilities, the building of day care centers and the promotion of traffic safety education. In addition, it began donating mobile clinics and blood-mobiles, as well as constructing blood banks around the country.

• 1971-1980

In the 70s, the foundation continued to pursue its efforts to improve social services through such measures as the distribution of ambulances, training in the use of fire fighting equipment, the development of preventative measures for earthquakes and PR for the fire-fighting sector. It also donated medical ships to provide medical aid for people living on remote islands in Japan’s inland sea.

In 1971, it began its overseas work, and in 1974 established the Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation^[2] for the purpose of eliminating leprosy as a public health problem—an effort that has resulted in its elimination in all but 2 of the 122 countries where the disease was initially prevalent.

• 1981-1990

Support for the maritime world remained an important focus in the 1980s, building on the work of the previous decade. Examples of projects include “Swift Wings,” which was a sail system designed for modern cargo ships, and research toward a “Techno Superliner,” a 1,000 ton cargo vessel that could attain speeds of up to 50 knots.

On the international cooperative support front, the foundation involved itself heavily in disaster relief, sending aid to help the victims of major disasters in countries around the world, and establishing the United Nations Sasakawa Award for Disaster Relief.^[3]

Health initiatives that began in this decade include the establishment of the WHO Sasakawa Health prize and a massive project to aid the victims of the Chernobyl nuclear power disaster, under which the foundation spent a total of more than USD 50 million over ten years, screening over 200,000 children for thyroid cancer.^[4]

In response to the Ethiopian famine of the mid-80s, the foundation began a program of agricultural education throughout sub-Saharan Africa that eventually reached 14 countries, improving farmers’ yields by up to 6 times in some places.

Finally, as a part of its human resources development program, the foundation created the Sasakawa Young Leaders’ Fellowship Fund^[5], a program that would eventually establish million-dollar funds at a total of 68 major universities around the world.

• 1991-2000

In the 90s, on the home front, the Nippon Foundation invested heavily in the elderly of Japan, pushing for the improvement of retirement homes, building model retirement homes, and helping the nation to develop its hospice system nearly from the ground up. Related to this field, the foundation also began donating specially equipped vehicles^[6] to social welfare facilities and groups, enabling them to provide mobility services to the elderly and those with disability.

The decade also saw one of Japan’s worst earthquakes of the 20th century, and the disorganization of volunteer groups in the wake of the quake lead the foundation to put special attention on bringing these many groups together under one umbrella—the volunteer support center—a central body that coordinated volunteer effort in the event of a major disaster.

In the maritime development field, the foundation began to turn its eye to the disparity in the level of training received by maritime experts in various countries. As a result, it provided funding for a scholarship for people from developing countries to attend the World Maritime University, in Malme, Sweden. In perhaps an even broader effort, it created the International Association of Maritime Universities, uniting 50 institutions around the world, in an effort to standardize both the level of education and the materials used.

• 2001-present

The past years have seen the foundation continue to build on its the work of the first four decades, working in the maritime, welfare and international cooperation fields.

Since its origins, the foundation has been interested in aiding the nation’s shipbuilding and maritime efforts, leading it to both support a display of throw its support behind a display of a North Korean spy vessel that had been sunk by the Japanese Self Defence Forces, and a survey of Okitori Island—one of^[7] the many Asian islands whose territoriality is under dispute.

In addition, the foundation is providing support toward the establishment of a user-pays system to help the nations surrounding the Strait of Malacca in their efforts to both police the waters and maintain their environmental integrity.

In international affairs, the foundation has most recently built more than 100 elementary schools in Myanmar and 100 in Cambodia. It has established a novel program to provide Mongolian nomadic families with boxes full of traditional medicines that can be replenished, at the cost only of those medicines used, a few times a year, when they come to market.

Current Priorities

Today, the foundation continues to support programs in the maritime, domestic social welfare, and international cooperative support fields.

From its website, it is most interested in supporting projects that fall under one of the following categories:

International Cooperative Support

• Improvement of Basic Human Needs

Initiatives to assist people throughout the world to meet their basic human needs, and to contribute to the improvement of human welfare through programs in such areas as healthcare, support of disabled persons and those who are socially vulnerable, agricultural development, population issues, community development, refugee aid, and disaster relief. In recent years, the foundation has been devoting a large amount of effort to the elimination of leprosy in both the medical and social (stigma-related) fields. Projects comprising novel ideas, approaches, and technology, as well as those that involve multilateral undertakings, such as south-south cooperation, will receive higher priority.

• Human Resources Development

Initiatives to foster a new generation of professionals, scholars, and students with a strong potential for future leadership. We support training and educational programs designed and executed by non-profit organizations and institutions of higher education. Our intention is to promote the formulation of an international network of professional people with shared goals and concerns.

• Promotion of International Collaborative Undertakings

Initiatives to foster cooperative approaches that meet the changing needs of the global community. We support cultural, social, and intellectual exchanges and collaborative undertakings which contribute to the development of greater mutual understanding and cooperative mindset in order to bring about social changes.^[8]

• Maritime Work

1. Projects that contribute to the formation of a new international order of the seas, by promoting mutual understanding and multilateral cooperation on ocean issues, and carrying out pioneering initiatives.
2. International capacity and network building projects that promote cooperation among ocean experts, as well as with experts in other fields, in order to foster a more comprehensive understanding of the ocean, and facilitate discovery/sharing of effective new technologies and knowledge.
3. Projects that foster sustainable regional development through multilateral cooperation, employing a comprehensive developmental approach that improves regional productivity while preserving the surrounding environment, including the coasts and ocean.
4. Projects that promote public understanding and appreciation of the ocean through international activities in the fields of social welfare, culture, and sports, with the cooperation/participation of ocean experts and professionals.
5. Other original and innovative international projects related to the ocean.^[9]

Criticism

Political Orientation

The Nippon Foundation has since its origins been directly involved in aiding Japan in both the domestic and international arenas. This has generally taken the form of support for the Japanese shipbuilding industry and for the improvement of welfare services around the nation. This focus has at times lead it to support such politically hot issues as the Okitori Island issue mentioned above. Such support has often been seized upon by eager conspiracy theorists as evidence that the foundation is itself in some way ultra-right or fascist, and that the humanitarian projects which comprise the bulk of its effort are in some way a front for darker motives. Just what those motives are is never made particularly clear, generally devolving into claims that the organization is trying to promote the national interest of Japan, and that this somehow is a bad thing. ^[10]

Founder

The criticism above seems to stem less from the foundation’s philanthropic record than from the fact that its founder was once on record as being anti-communist and in the mid 1970s jokingly referred to himself as “the world’s wealthiest fascist.”^{[11] [12][13]}

In the decade and a halfsSince Ryoichi Sasakawa’s death, the foundation has seen two other leaders take the helm, neither of whom seems to have exhibited more than the normal level of patriotism in guiding the organization. (see Ayako Sono, Yohei Sasakawa)

Japan Lobby

While references have been made to The Nippon Foundation’s participation in “the Japan Lobby,” specifically in regard to the United States^[14], a brief glance at the short list of projects supported by the foundation within the United States seems to refute this claim to a large degree. Most of the institution’s region-specific work in recent years has been conducted in Asia, with Africa a distant runner-up.

Organizations Established

• The Blue Sea and Green Land Foundation
• Fondation Franco-Japonaise Sasakawa
• Foundation for Encouragement of Social Contribution
• The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation
• Japan Gateball Union
• The Japan Science Society
• The Japanese Foundation for the Promotion of Maritime Science and The Museum of Maritime Science
• The Life Planning Center Foundation
• Marine Sports Foundation
• Nippon Ginkenshibu Foundation
• Nippon Music Foundation
• Nippon Taiko Foundation
• Ocean Policy Research Foundation
• Sasakawa Africa Association
• The Sasakawa Central Europe Fund
• Sasakawa Health Science Foundation
• The Sasakawa Japan-China Friendship Fund
• Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation
• The Sasakawa Peace Foundation
• The Sasakawa Pan-Asia Fund
• Sasakawa Sports Foundation
• The Scandinavia-Japan Sasakawa Foundation
• The Tokyo Foundation

References

1. ^ "Nippon Foundation financial statements (Japanese),"
2. ^ "Sasakawa Memorial Health Foundation,"
3. ^ "United Nations Sasakawa Award for Disaster Relief,"
4. ^ Chernobyl: Message for the 21st Century, p xvii.
5. ^ "Sasakawa Young Leaders’ Fellowship Fund"
6. ^ "The Nippon Foundation's mobility services program"
7. ^ "Japan and China Dispute a Pacific Islet," New York Times, July 10, 2005.
8. ^ "The Nippon Foundation's International Application Page"
9. ^ "The Nippon Foundation's International Application Page"
10. ^ "Fund-Raising in Japan: A Sasakawa Saga" by Hans H. Baerwald
11. ^ "The Godfather-san", Time, August 26 1974
12. ^ "Kishi and Corruption: An Anatomy of the 1955 System" by Richard J. Samuels
13. ^ "Sasakawa, A Respected War Criminal" by Denis Boneau
14. ^ "The Japan Lobby: An Introduction" by Robert Angel

External links

• The Nippon Foundation
• The Nippon Foundation Blogzine
• The Nippon Foundation YouTube