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ENGLISH 2024-02-10T11:30:24+09:00

Out Corporate Flier gives an overview of the activities of Litera Japan and its Founding Director Nishizawa. For downloading the flier click here .


   contact: office[at]literajapan.com

Query – LITERA JAPAN


Selected recent activities since 2020-2022, click here for blog


Interviews

An interview by a UK media outlet, Strategic Risk about Nishizawa’s path to risk communication specialist.Studied in the UK and Germany and then set up Litera Japan spacialised on risk communication. Please have a look!

Nuclear communicator | News | Strategic Risk Asia Pacific (strategicrisk-asiapacific.com)

Going atomic: Asia’s nuclear future | News | Strategic Risk Asia Pacific (strategicrisk-asiapacific.com)


Talks and lectures

Roundtable: Communication is Power for the Nuclear Industry in Japan@ The Mansfield Foundation

On December 2, 2022, the Mansfield Foundation convened a roundtable discussion with Dr. Mariko Nishizawa (Founding Director, Litera Japan) and Mr. Paul Dickman (Senior Policy Fellow, Argonne National Laboratory) who spoke on the challenges of recruiting a new generation of talent for the future of the nuclear industry in Japan. Dr. Nishizawa started the discussion by looking at why young talents are not joining the nuclear industry in Japan. (Click here for synopsis)


Publications (for free download)

A Springer book on risk communication (published in 2018) is an open access book for free-download. Nishizawa has contributed to a chapter on Fukushima Nuclear Accident and communication issues. PP.81-93.
Click → HERE (for download URL to retrieve the entire book)


IAEA Publication ” RISK COMMUNICATION AS A KEY DRIVER FOR FOSTERING A MORE RESILIENT SAFETY CULTURE: Two empirical cases from Japan in the post-Fukushima accident period” pp135-152. https://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/Publications/PDF/P1810_web.pdf


Global Research and Consultancy

Dr Nishizawa has spend 10 years in Europe for her research. She earned her PhD from Imperial College London in 2003 on risk policy and communication from the School of Humanities. She continued her research in Stuttgart, Germany until 2005.

Litera Japan provides advisory services to private firms and public organisations on risk-related issues in the fields varying from foods, dietary suppliments, agricultral products, chemicals, radioactive materials to energy.


An external partner at Dialogik gGmbH, a non-profit organisation led by Professor Ortwin Renn since 2000.


IAEA consultancy

Since 2023, Nishizawa has participated in and contributed to the discussions at a range of IAEA technical and consultancy meetings on environmental remediation and stakeholder engagement at different IAEA sections.

Nishizawa acted as a consultant at the IAEA on emergency communication and stakeholder involvement between 2016 and 2017. The document has been published as IAEA Standard No. GSG-14 for public communication in radiological emergency ( Arrangements for Public Communication in Preparedness and Response for a Nuclear or Radiological Emergency | IAEA).

She has given a plenary talk at an IAEA meeting. Its abstract is found in the following proceedings: Proceedings of an International Conference Held in Vienna, Austria, 22–26 February 2016. Human and Organizational Aspects of Assuring Nuclear Safety — Exploring 30 Years of Safety Culture 18-03861_P1810_book.indb (iaea.org)


Nuclear Reform Monitoring Committee at TEPCO

Nishizawa is a committee member of the Nuclear Reform Monitoring Committee of the Tokyo Electric Power Company, a third party advisory panel to the Management Board of the company since April 2021. After the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011, the firm is undergoing reforming process to secure nuclear safety and instill nuclear safety culture.

The latest committee meeting in 2022 from a click here

A selected newspaper article coverage on the meeting ( 東京電力「原子力改革監視委員会」が開催 | 原子力産業新聞 (jaif.or.jp)



Education and Training

Dr Nishizawa currently teaches technology and ethics at the Graduate School, University of Tsukuba. She taught at distinguished national universities such as Universiy of Tokyo and Tokyo Institute of Technology (Titech) on risk management and policy. At Titech she has give a series of lectures on nuclear safety for Japanese and foreign students in English.  AT the MBA course at BBT, she contributed to a class on technology and society.

Litera Japan provides tailored training for public/government institutes such as Japan’s Nuclear Regulatory Authority and Jaguar/Landrover on risk and crisis information delivery and stakeholder dialogue. Dr Nishizawa gives regular training courses and talks at a number of unversities/international bodies/ministries/corporations on risk/crisis communication and management.

Recently, Nishizawa is regularly teaching at the communication training programme (funded by MEXT and a joint programme with the IAEA) at Wakasawan Energy Centre/Fukui for regulatory personnels and future leaders from Middle East and Asian countries since 2018.

She is a regular guest lecturer at overseas universities such as the Taiwan National University.

 
 
 
 
 





COVID-19 Related Activities: Cheer the night district, save the community 2020-2021

An emergency action to support businesses in the midst of the COVID-19. We are currently running a project that supports dining businesses by providing hands-on advice and lessons on accurate and tailored preventative measures on COVID-19. This project is funded by Ready For, one of the largest Cloud funding organisation.

Click this link for photos and videos.

 
 
 




Capacity building for stakeholders in risk/emergency communication

Dr Nishizawa acted as a risk communication advisor to Iitate Village of Fukushima for 2011/2012 in charge of community health communication on radiological health effects in the aftermath of the nuclear accident in Fukushima. She acted as trained facilitator for roundtable sessions and dialogues  between scientists and evacuees.

This experience further led us to organise region-oriented dialogues on the future of nuclear energy generation. Litera Japan organised two stakeholder meetings in Shizuoka and Tokaimura in 2015/201-17 and Nishizawa acted as facilitaor at the events. It was not a meeting for deciding Yes/No of the use of nuclear energey but to share accurate safety information of nuclear energy as well as its socio-economic impacts on the communities. A similar citizens’ workshop on future energy senarios in Tokai region took place in 2019 organised by a NPO in Shizuoka – Litera Japan acted as a prime architect for the event (photos). Click here for photos from Shizuoka and those from Tokaimura between 2015 and 2017.

The roundtable dialogues on future energy use were reported at the IAEA symposium in 2016 and an investigation of a post-emergency communication has been publshed in Springer publication in 2018. Nishizawa is a contributing author to its proceeding, Nishizawa, M (2019) Risk Communication: A Key for Fostering a More Resilient Safety Culture, the International Conference on Human and Organizational Aspects of Assuring Nuclear Safety Culture, IAEA. Vienna, Austria.pp.135-152.



Developing and designing communication materials

Litera Japan develops science-based ready-to-be-used communication materials for risk communication by the use of infographics, illustrations and photographs. Samples are available on this site (only in Japanese). Click here for the link.


Policy advisory at the national level

Dr Nishizawa sits at different govenmental committess or public advisory boards such as Ministry of Health, Ministry of General Affairs (radiation), Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and Tokyo Fire Department. She is an Associated Member of Japan Science Council.  In response to the 3.11. Fukushima Nuclear Accident, she has given policy advices on the Cabinet Office, Ministry of Trade and Industry (METI), Ministry of Education (MEXT), Consumer’s Agency, Minstry of Health, Miyagi Prefectural Government, JA Fukushima and other related bodies.   



Media briefing/stakeholder dialogue

Since 2005, Litera Japan has organised a regular series of dialogue-based venue called “Sphere for Dialogue” “Sustainable Dialogue for foods” in Japan over 100 times on a range of topics such as food safety, EMF, radiological emergencies, Xray and health, dietary suppliments, drugs, and so forth.  Click here for photos.

Beyond Japan, Litera Japan orgnises special sessions on mobile phone and health effects in Geneve from  2016. Click here for photos.


Innovation, start-ups and gap funds

Litera Japan provies  hands-on advice for corporations/venture firms and startups in finding partners in the areas of agriculture/medical devices/foods.   Dr Nishizawa has served for the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST)  that runs a government-led gap funds and sat on a committee supporting university-bred technology seeds since 2016.

The company provides matching services for start-ups and private firms. A recent example is in the field of AI robotics and IoT.  It supports a Japanese start-up Hatapro Robotics whose AI robot, Zukku, will be displayed in the Osaka Expo 2025. Zukku assists and reduces workloads at care stations for eldery.

 

 

For more detailed research and consultancy of Litera Japan in Asia and worldwide,  click →HERE