31 March, 2023
Following the Great Japan Earthquake which devastated the seashore forests of the Tohoku Region in March 2011, OISCA started the first 10-year Coastal Forest Restauration Project (2011-2020) in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture with donations and grants amounting to about one billion yen from Japanese and foreign private companies, organizations and private individuals. So far, some 370,000 seedlings of black pine and board-leaved trees were planted over 103.05-hectare area and more than 12,000 volunteers from all over the country joined to help the project.
In March 2021, the first 10-year plan ended and immediately moved to the second 10-year plan (2021-2030) mainly for maintenance work of the planted seedlings such as weeding, clearing and thinning
Tokyo Marine and Nichido is one of the leading insurance business company in Japan. The company has been a corporate member of OISCA from the 1980s supporting mangrove forestation projects in various countries and the Natori Coastal Forest Restoration Project since 2011. In the past years, many staff of the company took part in volunteer activities in the Natori project. Last February, the company dispatched a filming team to produce a You Tube CM video to the project site in the Natori coastal area. The filming team conducted on the spot coverage for one month and interviewed a wide-range of stakeholders such as representatives of the disaster victims, project manager, young and senior local volunteers, so as to present the project comprehensively and also objectively. Masaki Aiba, a popular musician and TV personality, acted as a narrator in the video. The 3-minute video released through You Tube on March 22 generated a sensationally huge response with more than two million views in just a few days of viewing.