‘Seven Years After – Fukushima in July 2018’

Please click here to view this documentary from the homepage of Moving Image Archive, National Library of Scotland.

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Fukushima

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This is Japan Desk Scotland’s seventh documentary on environmental radiation in Fukushima.

In Koriyama City, carp faming prospered until the Fukushima nuclear accident of 11 March 2011. After the accident, carp merchants outside Fukushima Prefecture don’t want to market Koriyama carp as Fukushima carp, although they don’t contain radio caesium above the limit. To deal with such a situation, carp farmers’ union, the Prefectural research centre and Fukushima University collaborated to examine radio caesium in farmed carp in Koriyama. In addition, Koriyama City Council created a new post to work on carp. Are these efforts working to deal with the so-called ‘damage by rumour’?

In Tomioka Town near Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant, evacuation order was lifted in the ‘Restricted Residence’ zone and ‘Evacuation Order Cancellation Preparation’ zone in April 2017.  In March 2018, a base was selected inside ‘Difficult-to-Return’ zone, and decontamination work was soon to start. What are challenges for regenerating the town? How does ‘damage by rumour’ affect (former) Tomioka residents’ behaviour?     

Interviewed guests in order of appearance: Misaki Usuki, Toshihiro Wada, Kenji Nanba, Sumiyuki Kumada, a staff member of Kumada Fishery, Katsunori Yanai, Shouta Moritaka, Kencho Kawatsu, Norihito Harada, Seiji Ozawa, Fumiko Goto, Miyuki Sasaki, Takeshi Saito, Naoto Suda, Mayuko Noda, and Makoto Matsueda,  

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Camera: Fumi Nakabachi
Music: Taiko performed at the 18th Hina Matsuri at Glasgow Botanic Gardens
Directed and edited by: Yushin Toda
Produced by Fumi Nakabachi and Yushin Toda, Japan Desk Scotland
65 minutes
In Japanese with English subtitles
© 2019 Japan Desk Scotland

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This is part of Japan Desk Scotland’s documentary films production, and has been screened as follows:

(1) on Sunday 10 March 2019 at Wellington Church, Glasgow, Scotland, as part of the event to mark the eighth anniversary of the East Japan Earthquake;

(2) on Tuesday 4 June 2019 at University of Glasgow Chapel, Glasgow, Scotland, as part of Japanese Craft Documentaries co-organised by University of Glasgow Chaplaincy and Japan Desk Scotland as part of the West End Festival;

(3) on Tuesday 9 July 2019 at Fukushima University, Fukushima, Japan;

(4) on Tuesday 16 July 2019 at the Tuesday Seminar, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japan;

(5) on Friday 18 October 2019 at University of Glasgow Chapel, Glasgow, Scotland, as part of ‘Japanese Craft Documentaries’; and

(6) on Wednesday 26 February 2020 at Moving Image Archive, National Library of Scotland, Kelvin Hall, Glasgow, Scotland, as part of ‘Voices heard (documentaries)’.