Where do the donations go?

The Nippon Foundation

What is "the Nippon Foundation"?

The Nippon Foundation, the largest private non-profit organization established in 1962 in Japan, is a Social Innovation hub that works to achieve an integrated society through the development of areas that provide support for children, disabled people and disaster relief. "CHANGE FOR THE BLUE" is a project that launched in November 2018 as part of The Nippon Foundation's "Umi To Nippon Project" (Ocean and Japan Project). The project aims to raise social awareness of marine litter to the general public through the slogan "Stop adding anymore marine litter". The mission is to create a model for reducing marine litter in collaboration with stakeholders from industries, government, academia and private sectors that can be adopted by other regions across the globe.

We asked the Nippon Foundation about its cooperation with the JOIN: THE POWER OF CLOTHING.

Q1.What do you hope to accomplish with this donation?

Donations will be used to promote “SPOGOMI” (*), a coined word combining “sport” and “gomi” (trash in Japanese). “SPOGOMI” is a new type of sport from Japan that players compete who can pick up as much litter as possible within a time limit. By turning litter-picking into a competition with full of excitement and energy, we can create an opportunity to raise people’s awareness of ocean issues.
“SPOGOMI” encourages people to become more aware of how much litter surrounding their daily lives. Once one thinks of this as one’s own problem rather than someone else’s, it will shift one’s mindset and actions. We would like to further expand this initiative.
*Details will be announced by the end of 2022.

Q2.Why is the Nippon Foundation focusing on ocean garbage issues?

Human beings cannot live without the ocean. The ocean produces food and the very air we breathe. On the other hand, study says that plastics in the ocean will outweigh fish by 2050 if we keep producing plastics at predicted rates, and that these plastics could not only endanger ocean life but make their way into ourselves through food chains.
The riches of the ocean are vast, but selfish human activities has become a major threat to ocean health and pushed the ocean into crisis. As a foundation that has committed to a variety of wide-ranging issues in the ocean field since its establishment, we would like to develop a model case for countermeasures against marine litter with our many years of experience and networks.

Q3.What are your expectations for the JOIN: THE POWER OF CLOTHING?

About 80% of marine litter comes from land-based activities, and thus, our everyday activities, regardless of where we live, have an impact on the ocean for better or worse. Every action counts to reduce marine litter and to help save our ocean.
This campaign not only creates an opportunity for customers to bring attention to the marine litter issue but also leads them to an action-with-purchase. We firmly believe that the collaboration with various sectors from industry, government, academia, and NPOs will be the foundation of “stop ocean litter” movement.