Dear Readers,

We are happy to release our fifth issue of the ISHES Newsletter! We hope you enjoy reading our articles from Japan related to happiness, economy and society. In this December 2018 issue, you will find the following articles:

- Ajinomoto Group: Sustainable Growth by Addressing Social Issues through Business

The Ajinomoto Group is a major Japanese manufacturer of food and beverage products. It has been engaged in initiatives it refers to as ASV (The Ajinomoto Group Creating Shared Value) to address issues facing society through its business activities. . . .

- New articles from the Research Institute for Creating New Paradigms based on Eastern and Western Wisdom

An article from the column by Yoshifumi Taguchi, entitled "Taoist Thought and Japan's Heart: The Essence of Taoist Thought" has been uploaded on the web.
https://inst-east-and-west.org/en/taguchi/2018/002574.html

- Recommended articles from the JFS Newsletter on sustainability issues in Japan

This time we introduce an article on the traditional "set-net fishing" technique used in Himi, Toyama Prefecture. It might offer some valuable ideas on how the world's fishing industries could become more sustainable.

Sustainable Fishery Catches Only 30% of Fish Entering Net -- Etchu-type Set Net Fishing in Himi
https://www.japanfs.org/en/news/archives/news_id035570.html

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Ajinomoto Group: Sustainable Growth by Addressing Social
Issues through Business

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The Ajinomoto Group, a major Japanese manufacturer of food and beverage products, has been engaged in initiatives it refers to as ASV (The Ajinomoto Group Creating Shared Value) to address issues facing society through its business activities. ASV is positioned at the core of the Group's corporate philosophy to realize its mission of contributing "to the world's food and wellness and to better lives for the future," as well as its vison of becoming "a genuine global food company group with specialties guided by its leading-edge bioscience and fine chemical technologies."

ASV was announced in 2014 as part of the FY2014-2016 Medium- Term Management Plan. It calls for more specific contributions to social issues in the area of "Health and well-being," "Food resources" and "Global sustainability," and defines four "stories" about actions for resolving these issues.

ASV Value Creation Stories
1. Contributing to health and well-being by utilizing its leading-edge bioscience and fine chemical technologies, which also lead to deliciousness technologies, and by delivering good and healthy food.
2. Contributing to the development of a society that enables strong family/social bonds and diverse lifestyles through eating well.
3. Contributing to the sustainability of society and the earth with its customers and local communities, across the value chain from production to consumption.
4. Co-creating value with each region through the perspectives of the customers, with its global, top-class and diverse talents.

In order to advance ASV successfully, each employee needs to understand the concepts of ASV and put them into practice. Thus the Ajinomoto Group established the ASV Awards in FY2016 to recognize excellent initiatives. At the FY2017 ASV Awards, Junko Edahiro, president of Institute for Studies in Happiness, Economy and Society (ISHES), served as an independent judge.

Specifically, what kinds of initiatives are going on through ASV? Here we introduce two initiatives, one in Japan and one abroad.


'Salt Reduction/Optimal Salt' Initiatives in Tohoku Region

People of the Tohoku region in northeastern Japan have traditionally used a high quantity of salt in their diet. It is said that this is due to the region's relatively cold climate. To survive the snowy Tohoku winters, long ago the people had to preserve their food with salt. But as they got accustomed to salty tastes, it seems that high salt intake became a part of the region's food culture.

It has been pointed out that excessive salt intake leads to cerebrovascular diseases (CVD). According to the 2012 Vital Statistics Survey by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan's top three prefectures for the CVD death rate were all in the Tohoku region.

Under such circumstances, the Tohoku Branch of Ajinomoto Co. has been working on a project to spread the idea of low and proper salt intake since 2014.

The Tohoku Branch first started working on the "Dashi-katsu" health promotion project in Aomori Prefecture. It proposed tasty low-salt menu ideas using Japanese umami soup stock ("umami" is a savory taste and recognized as one of the five basic tastes, "dashi" is a Japanese word for soup stock, and "dashi-katsu" means the active use of dashi), with the aim of promoting healthy diets, and worked in collaboration with the prefectural government and major distributors. Since then the branch has continued with project activities such as conducting seminars for local supermarkets and cooperating with event planning to expand reduced-salt menus.

In Iwate Prefecture, working with major local retailers, the Tohoku Branch encouraged the prefectural government to recognize the importance of salt reduction and optimal salt intake. In July 2015, the government launched a public awareness campaign and designated the 28th of each month as "Iwate Low and Proper Salt Intake Day."

The branch offers seminars on the theme of salt reduction using dashi stock and proposes healthy menu items such as taro potato soup, using locally grown seasonal ingredients. The health awareness and low salt menus are promoted through distribution channels using flyers, in-store promotions at supermarkets, and even media coverage at events using the prefecture's local mascot.

According to survey results from the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, the average daily salt intake of males living in Iwate dropped from 12.9 grams in 2012 to 10.7 grams in 2016, and for females from 11.1 grams to 9.3 grams. Both are now close to the national average.

As the campaign went on, the total number of stores involved in the promotion of reduced-salt products has increased year after year. In FY2017, it was 3.8 times the number in FY2015. Correspondingly, sales of reduced-salt products for households increased by 45% from FY2014 to FY2017.

In Iwate, the Tohoku Branch established a model for promoting low and proper salt intake by working in cooperation with the prefectural government, media and distributors. The branch intends to expand this Iwate model to other prefectures in Tohoku and further increase opportunities for value creation.


Nutrition Improvement Project in Vietnam

There is a worldwide movement to realize nutrition improvement in developing countries through public-private collaboration, and expectations toward the business sector are increasing. In 2010, the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) initiative was launched as a global framework to address nutritional problems in developing countries. As of October 2018, 60 developing countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America were participating as SUN countries, including Vietnam.

One of Vietnam's nutritional challenges is that it is suffering from both under-nutrition and over-nutrition. This is thought to be due to a lack of public knowledge and awareness about nutrition. Also, in the absence of any guidelines for nutritionally balanced meals at elementary schools, school lunches were not supporting children's healthy development.

In that context, the Ajinomoto Group launched the Vietnam Nutritional System Establishment Project (VINEP) and the Vietnam School Meal Project (SMP), with the aim of addressing nutritional problems in Vietnam.

VINEP started in 2011 with an agreement between Vietnam's National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) and Ajinomoto Co. to train knowledgeable experts who can convey correct information about nutrition. In 2012, the Ministry of Education and Training approved a four-year bachelor program in nutrition at the Hanoi Medical University. Classes started in 2013, and the first 43 students graduated in 2017, the first dieticians trained in Vietnam.


In the meantime, VINEP was engaged in discussions about laws and regulations. The Vietnamese Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Home Affairs established a job code for dieticians (legal occupational status) in 2015. This was the fruit of years of effort through VINEP, such as annual nutrition- related workshops and persistent discussions with authorities. As a result, many of the trained and newly certified dieticians were able to get jobs at hospitals and government agencies, etc. Since 2017, there have been new efforts aimed at establishing more concrete and integrated nutritional standards for the country.

Furthermore, VINEP also plans to help increase the number of universities that will provide the basis for nutritional education. To do so, there are plans to create a nutritional education center to train new teachers and enhance the training and education system. In this connection, the management of VINEP was transferred from Ajinomoto Co. to the Ajinomoto Foundation in April 2017.

The School Meal Project (SMP) was launched in 2012. SMP prepared and distributed food education booklets and school-meal menu books with an eight-week menu tailored to local tastes. While setting up model kitchens across the nation, SMP also developed software for planning lunch menus.

In January 2017, it was decided that the menu-design software would be introduced at 3,880 elementary schools that have cooking facilities. Currently, SMP is engaged in explaining how elementary schools can utilize the software. The project will continue to pursue its target of offering nutritionally balanced school meals to over 1.4 million children in 4,061 schools by 2019.

With regard to the economic benefits from these efforts, the Ajinomoto Group enjoys increased trust in its own companies, improved brand value by having the market correctly understand product benefits, increased sales through the development of recipes using its own products, and so on.

The Ajinomoto Group Integrated Report 2017 includes the following statement about the ASV value creation model: "ASV creates a virtuous cycle that reinvests the economic value created through the resolution of social issues in our business activities, which in turn contributes to the further resolution of social issues. In this way, ASV represents a strategic initiative for realizing sustainable growth."

In this newsletter we have introduced some examples of how ASV is a value creation model that is generating a variety of initiatives. It is definitely worth following ASV in the future to see how it evolves and how it connects efforts to address social issues with the improvement of corporate value.

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Reference
Ajinomoto Group Integrated Report 2018
https://www.ajinomoto.com/en/aboutus/pdf/integrated_report.pdf

ASV STORIES 2018
https://www.ajinomoto.com/en/activity/csr/pdf/2018/ajinomoto_asv_stories18_en.pdf

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New articles from the Research Institute for Creating New Paradigms
based on Eastern and Western Wisdom

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In this section we introduce the latest articles posted on the website of the Research Institute for Creating New Paradigms based on Eastern and Western Wisdom.

This time we introduce an article from a column by Yoshifumi Taguchi, entitled "Taoist Thought and Japan's Heart: The Essence of Taoist Thought." In Taoist thought, it is in a person's heart that truth can be found. What exactly does that mean? We hope you enjoy reading.

Taoist Thought and Japan's Heart: The Essence of Taoist Thought
https://inst-east-and-west.org/en/taguchi/2018/002574.html

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Recommended articles from the JFS Newsletter on sustainability issues in
Japan

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In this regular section in each issue of the ISHES Newsletter, we recommend past articles from Japan for Sustainability newsletters. The non-profit JFS was active from August 2002 until July 2018, sending out information to the world with the aim of moving society in Japan and the world toward being more sustainable and happy.

This month we introduce an article about "Etchu-type set net fishing," a sustainable fishing technique with 400 years of history originating in Himi City, Toyama Prefecture facing the Sea of Japan. How can the fishing industry become more sustainable? That is a question for the whole world to answer, but perhaps this approach from Japan, with its diet largely focused fish and shellfish, can provide some valuable ideas.

The set net fishing technique is described as being friendly for both the environment and for people. But what exactly is it? Please read on and enjoy!

Sustainable Fishery Catches Only 30% of Fish Entering Net -- Etchu-type Set Net Fishing in Himi
https://www.japanfs.org/en/news/archives/news_id035570.html

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Season's Greetings from ISHES
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We take this opportunity to express our heartfelt appreciation for the interest, encouraging feedback, and continuous support we have received from you, our readers and supporters, during the past year.

Please note that our office will be closed from December 27 to January 6 and any requests received during that period will be handled in the new year.

We wish you a Happy New Year in 2019!

ISHES Team
"Institute for Studies in Happiness, Economy and Society
E-mail: inquiry_en@ishes.org
www.ishes.org/en/

*The Institute for Studies in Happiness, Economy and Society (ISHES) is an organization based in Japan that is working to build a happy and sustainable society. To this end, we need to think about happiness, economy and society together by learning from, analyzing, and thinking about theories and cases in Japan and around the world regarding what happiness is and what kind of economy and society will create and support happiness.

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