Tsukuba

Confirmed Speakers

• Fumiya Itoh
  The director of Gokigen Farm (agricultural organization) The 1st Ibaraki Dream Presentation Competition great prize winner. Born in 1988. During his college days, he learned issues of agriculture and employment of challenged people through internship at Gokigen Farm. At the agricultural corporation, Mizuho, he also learned expertise in agriculture focusing on spinach. Additionally, working experiences at the institute for supporting challenged people helped him to understand the reality of the field of welfare for the challenged. Based on those experiences, he founded a non-profit organization “Tsukuba Agri Challenge” with its CEO Tatsuo Igrashi. In April 2011, he became a director of Gokigen Farm and currently, he dedicates to cultivate baby leaf and foreign vegetables by utilizing 2 hectares idle lands with more than 60 challenged people.
• Shunsuke Moriya
  Sōran Bushi (fisherman’s dance) performer. Born in 1986 at Ebetsu-city, Hokkaido. During his college days at the School of Health and Phisical Education, University of Tsukuba, Shunsuke Moriya founded Kiri-Kiri-Mai, the Sōran Bushi performance team, and started performing Sōran Bushi, one of the most famous contemporary dances in Japan inspired by the traditional sea shanty in Hokkaido. Since the foundation of Kiri-Kiri-Mai, he has been passionate about bringing people together under the philosophy of “universal Sōran,” which indicates all of the people can enjoy it regardless of their age, sexes, nationality, or disability. While working as trainer to promote people’s health, he organized “Furusato Tsukuba Yui-Matsuri”, the local festival taken place at Tsukuba-city.
• Ko Hayakawa
  Chairman of NPO "Yanaka no Mori no Moribito." Ko Hayakawa was born in 1981, and finished his doctor degree of International Politics and Economyin University of Tsukuba, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Now He is the chairman of “Yanaka no Mori no Moribito” (The Guardians of Yanaka House). He has started his research in the foot area of Mt. Tsukuba (especially Hojo district) since 2007 for his doctoral thesis. During his research, he founded “Team Gojappe”, a student Group for local activity in the foot of Mt.Tsukuba, and started to create special products and relationships with local people and students. In 2010, he founded NPO “Yanaka no Mori no Moribito” to preserve the local cultural heritage: The old Yanaka House, and through this activity he looks for a new relationships of local people and students.
• Elizabeth Robles
  Artist, Chairperson of Elizabeth Art School e[Art]. Elizabeth
 was
 born
 in
 Philippine
 and
 studied
 arts
 at
 Philippine
University. She
 came 
to
 Japan
in 
1991
 as
 a
 research
 student
 and 
got 
a 
doctor
 degree
 of 
production
 design
 in
 1996. She
 runs
 Elizabeth
 Art
 School
 in
 Tsukuba
 city
 and
 teaches
 crafts, drawings, modern
 art
 and
 mix
media 
to 
various 
range 
of 
people 
from
 children
 to 
adults. She
 places
 importance
 on
 not
 only
 the
 techniques
 of
 arts
 but
 also
 the
 students'
 innate
 creativity
 and
 talents
 in
 teaching
 and
 let
 people
 express
 their
 humanity
 through
 arts. To
 contribute
 to
 society, she
 often
 holds
 charity
 art
 events
 to
 help
 people
 in
 need, especially
 who
 suffered
 from
 earthquake
 and

 children
 who
 are 
suffering 
from
 cancer.
 She always says, 

"It 
is 
my 
responsibility
 to 
seek 
out 
my 
students' 
originalities 
and 
talents."
• Yuka Mitsuhata
  Company president of Mo-House A mother of three children. In 1997, after having her second child, the breastfeeding experiences in the train motivated her to start creating nursing wears to propose “The New Lifestyle After Childbirth”. She engaged in variety of activities such as Salon and ”Happy Birth Day – Comfortable childbirth and breastfeeding experience” to support childbirth and breast-feeding. Based on those her activities, she is also implementing “Working with Child-rearing” as conventional and novel method at the Aoyama shop and departments. In March 2012, she opened “mo-baco” in Tsukuba, Ibaraki as the community place where men and women of all age groups get together and act to create new movements. She is also spreading knowledge about working with child-rearing to support women’s life design and researching about breastfeeding lifestyle through founding “Mother Life Association” and “Research Institution of Good Breastfeeding Lifestyle”.