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Life Onboard |
LAST UPDATE
July 12, 2005
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| site design imagesparkle.com |
| December 12, 2004 |
Slow down and live it up – Ryuichi Nakamura |
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| Ryuichi Nakamura pouring fair trade coffee with two helpers |
His slow walk, eloquent speech and natural way of life are a stark contrast to the rat race, high speed pace that many Japanese people are used to. Ryuichi Nakamura owns his own windfarm on the southern island of Japan, which processes organic coffee imported from various South American countries. He is also one of the founding members of the NGO “The Sloth Club”, whose aim is to promote a slower, less consumption-based and healthier way of life. Joining Peace Boat from South Africa to Brazil, Nakamura gave talks and workshops on his business, NGO and life philosophy. |
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| The ‘Slow’ philosophy embraces the embattled Article 9, the anti-war clause of Japan’s constitution which prohibits Japan from participating in armed conflict and from maintaining armed forces. |
At an early age, Nakamura contracted a disease known as Minamata, which can be caused by consuming fish contaminated with high concentrations of mercury. For personal reasons, he therefore became active in preventing environmental pollution, especially after discovering that nuclear contaminated food from the Chernobyl disaster was being exported to developing countries. Nakamura became an organic farmer and travelled to South America on a quest to find coffee bean plantations. Once he established personal connections with organic farmers in Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico, Columbia and Peru, he began to import coffee beans and roast them in Japan. In doing so, Nakamura was initiating the fair trade movement in Japan, as well as healthy business, as he believes that one-to-one contact between producer and consumer is an essential component in environmentally friendly practice. |
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| Feeling the power of Brazilian music while on a study and exchange programme in a Rio de Janiero favela. |
Nakamura’s philosophy is that recognizing the connection between people automatically fuels a natural connection to nature. But he states “We have lost this. Time is money. Yes, time is important but it is not equal to money. We have lost this connection with each other because we are simply too busy and we prefer to do business for the best deal, not the best business relationship”. Based on the idea that humans, nature and business are the same, our current stressful climate, according to Nakamura, is caused through a lack of integrity in our modern day culture. “We have forgotten how to live because we are moving so fast”. |
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Keibo Oiwa, the author of “Slow is beautiful” was inspired by Nakamura’s philosophy and so in 1999, Oiwa, Nakamura, together with Australian environmentalist and musician Anja Light, decided to form an NGO to promote slow living. They named their NGO “The Sloth Club.” Their admiration for the sloth is not only because of its slow movements, but because of its mutually beneficial and sustaining relationship with its natural environment and nature-conserving lifestyle: the sloth only eats what it needs. Their NGO holds public speaking events to show how “fast” increases stress, which in turn escalates violence. This leads onto destruction not only of human relationships but also of the environment. Their aims are therefore to get the general public to slow down, create space for compassion and fair treatment. |
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Earlier this year the “Slow Business School” was established by the Sloth Club to help people set up their own businesses in an environmentally friendly way. Fair trade, organic farming, alternative energy forms, human relations and sustainable development are some of the school’s business objectives. The long distance learning programme currently has 110 students who are setting up their own company as a kind of on-the-job training. “Learning by doing and enjoying the learning is the concept of slow life business training. However, one of the most important aspects of this process is face to face meetings between producers and consumers in order to create harmony, balance and understanding in trade and industry. |
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The Sloth Club runs the organic “Café Slow” in Kokubunji, Tokyo. The café’s straw bale building and earthy interior is an oasis for city people to go to and relax, drink, eat organic produce, listen to live performances, and get informed about social justice issues and global fair trade movements.
By coming onboard, Nakamura encouraged Peace Boat participants to reflect on the pace of their lives in Japan, reassess their values and open their minds to socially responsible business entrepreneurial movements. On the eve of his departure he and a group of participants created an onboard Eco-café, serving organic tea and coffee and selling fair trade products, such as reusable chopsticks and coffee filters. |
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For more information on Nakamura’s different projects see the following:
Organic coffee company – www.windfarm.co.jp
The Sloth Club – www.sloth.gr.jp
Café Slow – www.cafeslow.com |
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