Juichi Shibusawa

Born in Tokyo in 1952.

He spent his early childhood in Bangkok, Thailand, where his father was posted. Seeking a grounded way of living during a turbulent period in Japanese society, he entered Tokyo University of Agriculture and later completed its doctoral program.

In 1980, he went to Paraguay as a Japan International Cooperation Agency specialist at the national agricultural experiment station. After returning to Japan, he joined the creation of Nagasaki Holland Village, Nagasaki Bio Park, and the circular city project Huis Ten Bosch, serving in management roles from planning through construction and operations.

At Huis Ten Bosch, he worked with advanced environmental systems including rainwater use, desalination, high-performance wastewater treatment, underground structural design, local heating using liquefied natural gas, cogeneration, fuel cells, waste sorting, reuse, and composting. Through this work he encountered the limits of solving environmental issues through money and technology alone, and left in 1995.

From 1995 onward, he worked in Vietnam, Myanmar, Ecuador, and other countries on mangrove restoration, sustainable community management, and the restructuring of state-owned companies in inland China.

Since 1997, as chair of the Trees and Environment Network Association, he has worked with environmental NGOs in Japan and abroad on forest and community initiatives.