“Collective Impact to Solve Local Issues Project” selected four organizations for FY2020.

We invited applications for this project from January 2021 through February 2021, and received applications from 24 applicant organizations.
Based on the application guidelines and selection criteria, the screening committee consisting of members from the secretariat and outside experts discussed each application and made a final decision at a meeting of the foundation’s board of directors after rigorous screening processes. This project has once again set the challenge of “resolving the decline in vitality in rural and regional communities” against the backdrop of demographic changes such as population decline, falling birthrates, and the aging of society, and aims to demonstrate solutions to social issues through the innovative method of collective impact. For example, we aim to halt the decline in the vitality of local communities by ensuring that businesses that play an important social role in each region, such as medical care, long-term care, and distribution, are maintained in a sustainable manner. The aim of this project is to demonstrate that by working together with multiple companies and organizations to collectively address regional issues in order to maintain and enhance the sustainability of these important social programs for the region, both regional development and contribution to the core business can be realized. After this project is completed, we also expect that the project will be continued by the implementing organizations and that similar projects will be created in other regions (including initial cost-sharing by public institutions, etc.). To this end, we will not only provide support through dormant deposit funds, but will also provide management support to build networks and strengthen the capacity of the organizations responsible for these activities in order to ensure the sustainability of the collective support mechanism for important social projects. In addition, we will work together with the organizations to visualize the results (impact) of activities for “community revitalization” through this project in a form that is easy for everyone to understand, and to establish a function and mechanism to measure the degree to which the results are meaningful to the community.

General Incorporated Association Eat and Energize the East”.

Eat,and Energize the East. will promote the agriculture, forestry, fisheries, and food industry in the Hamadori region of Fukushima Prefecture which is still in the process of recovery, especially the fishing industry where there are concerns about reputational damage, by creating hero producers and hit products by using its know-how in positive branding and story telling to outweigh the negative effects of reputational damage, by expanding sales channels outside the region, and by creating a community of fans. The project will promote reconstruction by expanding sales channels outside the region and creating a community of fans.

■Subsidy amount
49,875,000 yen
■Reasons for selection
This is an important social issue that aims to revive the production of fisheries in Fukushima Prefecture, which is still in a state of experimental operation 10 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, and to promote the recovery of food-related industries in the target area while restoring local production for local consumption, in which local food is distributed locally. In addition, since there are aspects of the project that are difficult for the government to address, the project is highly appropriate as a dormant deposit project that addresses issues that are in the narrow focus of the government. This organization has been working on the reconstruction of Tohoku’s food and agriculture industries through a collective approach and has achieved a certain level of success, so although it is a difficult issue, the project is expected to produce positive results.

Click here for the website of “General Incorporated Association: Eat,and Energize the East.

Non-profit Organization “TMS net

TMS net for comprehensive and continuous provision of medical and welfare services that enable people to live to the end of their lives with peace of mind through coordination of medical treatment functions, sharing of human resources, and joint efficiency of management, etc. It aims to build a system to provide comprehensive and continuous medical and welfare services that enable people to live to the end of their lives with peace of mind.

■Subsidy amount
49,875,000 yen
■Reasons for selection
This organization intends to promote coordination and efficiency of medical and nursing care in the Tajima region, a secondary medical care area, and to establish a regional comprehensive care system based on the “Japan Sea Healthcare Net” which is an advanced case study in Yamagata Prefecture. The establishment of medical and nursing care coordination and community comprehensive care is an important social issue for any region in the future, and it’s deemed to become further important in the midst of the Corona Disaster. The approach of this project to solving these issues is a collective approach, in which local doctors, base hospitals, medical associations, nursing care providers, pharmacies, etc. are linked from the bottom up. This project will be potentially a role model for other regions if it succeeds.

　Click here for the website of “TMS net” (in Japanese only)

Non-profit Organization “Support for Utilization of Vacant Houses and Land SAGA”

The goal of this project is to utilize vacant houses — which are desired to be solved in terms of disaster prevention, landscape preservation sanitation, and crime prevention — to develop a logistics base, to create an ecosystem to strengthen food support for poor families with children im collaboration with other organizations and to create jobs for low-income families.

■Subsidy amount
47.25 million yen
■Reasons for selection
This organization ambitiously aims to build an eco-system to utilize vacant houses, establish distribution warehouses and delivery centers, build a system to deliver donated goods from companies to households in town, leading to food support for poor families. The problem of vacant houses is becoming more serious in many areas, including from the perspective of landscape and public safety, while the issue of poverty among children, who will be leaders-to-be of our society, persists as an important social issue to be solved. The project is consistent with the NPO’s strengths in the field of vacant house utilization and its collective approach to creating jobs and providing food assistance to needy families in cooperation with other players.

Click here for the website of “Nonprofit Organization: Vacant House and Land Utilization Support SAGA

Local Life Design, a non-profit organization*SIIF decided to discontinue this project in March 2023 by mutual consent after discussions with LLD due to the difficulty of ensuring the project’s implementation.

In the Onagawa area, where the population and the number of commercial and industrial businesses have been declining since the Great East Japan Earthquake, SIIF aims to increase employment in the area and create a community where people can continue to live by establishing a comprehensive start-up support system, including investment and financing for new businesses, through the launch of the Onagawa Regional Start-up Consortium.

■Subsidy amount
31.5 million yen
■Reasons for selection
This organization’s project aims to increase employment in the Onagawa area where the population and the number of commercial and industrial businesses have been declining since the Great East Japan Earthquake, , and to create a community where people can continue to live by establishing the Onagawa Regional Start-up Consortium and building a comprehensive start-up support system that includes investment and financing for new businesses. The decline in regional vitality due to decreasing population and industrial hollowing-out is a serious social issue in any region, and this project is in line with basic policy of the dormant deposit system (fostering independent bearers of private sector public interest activities and contributing to the development of an environment in which private sector funds can be raised by the private sector on their own) in the sense that it aims to restore regional vitality by fostering sustainable businesses that solve social issues. This project also has the potential to become a role model for other regions if it succeeds in building start-up support system using a collective approach with companies and organizations in and outside the region.