インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動 : シベリア沿海州サマルガ河流域と市川市真間川の場合(インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動特集号)

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概要

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• At the outset, it should be noted that the final version of this paper was compiled by Nobuo Ota following the sudden death of Yoichi Shimozawa, Professor of the Faculty of Commerce and Economics at Chiba University of Commerce. Mr. Ota, a research colleague of Professor Shimozawa, was deeply moved by his partner's concern with the natural environment during his lifetime, and took it upon himself to expand all sections of the paper to bring the work to completion. The paper consists of three parts. Part 1 addresses the issue "of the preservation of forest lands in the Samarga River Basin in the Maritime Province of Siberia," while Part 2 deals with the more familiar local problem of pollution in the Mama River in Ichikawa City (Chiba Prefecture in Japan). Part 3 envisions a cross-border approach in seeking to resolve the environmental problems existing in both this far-removed region (Part 1) and the more local community (Part 2) on a simultaneous and parallel basis. To move in that direction, the question of how to best utilize the Internet in combination with a communications satellite equipped with a translation system for 70 different languages is applied to both of these themes. The issue of preserving forest lands in the Samarga River Basin addressed in Part 1 involves an international volunteer project using the Internet, which places its main focus on preventing global warming. This project emerged as an extension of international volunteer activities in Nepal dating from 1997. In those efforts, a solar power generator was installed in a mountainous part of the northwest region of Nepal, lying 3,700 meters above sea level. The goal was to contribute to environmental protection, resolving visual handicaps, respiratory organ diseases and other health problems of the residents in this region, which has yet to be opened up to modern civilization. This Nepal problem was highly appropriate as a region to initially experience an international volunteer project. The reasons for this include the limited span of the area, as well as the fact that the project was not multinational in makeup-that is, only Japan (a group from Chiba University of Commerce) participated in that particular international volunteer effort. In contrast to this, the move to preserve the forestland of the Samarga River Basin and in doing so prevent global warming, has consisted of a multiple number of groups representing various nationalities. Besides this, with this problem ranking as the region's most acute environmental issue, it was critical that action be taken promptly and that an even greater degree of experience and participation zeal be part of the effort. In the event that the forests on this land were logged, the permafrost beneath the Taiga would melt away, with large amounts of gas (known as a "methane gas bomb") discharged into the atmosphere from organic matter that has accumulated to a subterranean depth of about 300 meters since ancient times. In this connection, methane gas is said to possess some 20 times the greenhouse warming effects of carbon dioxide. Another problem in this area is that, during the summer months, fires frequently break out on lands that have been logged. In striving to preserve the forests of this region, a basic policy has been adopted to invite in so-called "eco-tours" from Japan, the U.S. and other countries to help protect the lifestyles of the region's residents, as well as conserve the forest areas. Turning to Part 2 of the paper, which discusses an environmental problem in a more familiar region, compared to the environmental issue in the far-removed region, the need arose for more immediate fieldwork in the local region. Based on this, the decision was made to deal with the two problems on a simultaneous and parallel basis. Both regions shared in common the fact that the problems they faced were extremely serious in nature. In order to resolve the problems in Part 1 and Part 2 on a simultaneous and parallel basis, attempts are being made to utilize the Internet in combination with the aforementioned communications satellite equipped with a translation system capable of handling 70 different languages. In dealing with environmental issues, there are two problems that inevitably must be considered. The first is that environmental issues are never fully contained within set borders or in single limited regions. For example, even if the Mama River were to be successfully cleaned up, this would not resolve the problem of contamination expanding into Tokyo Bay or beyond that into the open seas. In short, global-scale environmental problems that reach across set borders into wide-area zones must be dealt with on a global scale. The second problem involves the need to obtain the understanding and cooperation of the local residents to truly resolve the problems at hand. The use of the aforementioned system seeks to find solutions to these two problems at a high level. The use of the system will be realized through the support of Virtual Foundation Japan, Virtual Foundation USA, and Teachers Without Borders group, along with numerous other foundations, companies and groups in Japan and the United States. In approaching the Mama River environmental problem, the action plan first calls for local elementary, junior and senior high school students, residents and administrators to jointly address the issue. The idea is to simultaneously reach out across borders to consider this environmental challenge on a multidimensional basis (through the eyes of people in 70 different countries around the world), and then move in the direction of resolution. Based on such progress, it would then be possible to extend the far-reaching effects of this success story to all small, medium and large rivers that empty into Tokyo Bay. There are high hopes that this use of the Internet in combination with the communications satellite equipped with a 70-language translation system will emerge as a 21^<st> century model for resolving global-scale environmental dilemmas. Meanwhile, while the use of this system will commence from the realm of environmental issues, it is also expected to prove effective in various other fields as well-IT education, cross-cultural exchange, the learning of multiple numbers of foreign languages, cultivation of successors to deal with environmental issues and in other areas. In this sense, the contents of Part 1 and Part 2 of this paper are mutually integrated in Part 3.

• 千葉商科大学の論文
• 2002-09-30

著者

• 太田 信雄

  千葉商科大学政策情報学部

• 太田 信雄

  千葉商科大学

関連論文

• 英語の学び方・教え方
• 第1部 諸外国から見た日本の英語教育(外国語教育の異文化間コミュニケーション論的研究特集号)
• まえがき(外国語教育の異文化間コミュニケーション論的研究特集号)
• インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動 : シベリア沿海州サマルガ河流域と市川市真間川の場合(インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動特集号)
• 「TOEICとTOEFLから見た日本の外国語教育」
• International Volunteer Activities by the Internet--Targeting the Samarga River in the Maritime Province of Siberia and the Mama River in Ichikawa City (インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動特集号)
• インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動--シベリア沿海州サマルガ河流域と市川市真間川の場合 (インターネットを使っての国際ボランティア活動特集号)
• 外国語教育の異文化間コミュニケーション論的研究(リサーチ&レビュー)

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