"Food and Culture"

Reports from participants group

"We owe our life to other things ! The earth is life community."

Host : KATAYAMA Kazuo

" Let us think about the earth and environment starting from our daily food. Let us study the invention by producers and the characteristic of producing districts through 'food' and convey them. Why don't we cook using information from producing districts as study material while making use of WSN information network ? Looking forward to your participation."

---

• Goal
  
  Is there any relation between food and culture ?
  
  Let us think about our life and natural environment through food. The ingredient has a close relation with natural environment of the region and social environment. Our life has been affected much by the primary industry supporting the region for a long time and has formed the peculiar " culture " of that region, hasn't it ? We would like to watch the situation of our own by the cultural comparison of various regions through " foods " using WSN network.
  
  

• How to participate in.
  
  
  • This is a project circle of everybody. WSN is going to suggest the summary of the project circle and each participating group will be a leader as far as activities are concerned. It is possible for you to join it according the summary and the schedule of each study of yours. Please participate in it with your idea as well.
    
    
  • We will make the use of WSN website where you can announce and motivate the activity.
    
    
  • Let us be involved in the management of the project circle while using the teachers' mailing list of each participating group and making the start of study each other .
    
    
  • We will recommend you to stop on the way so that you can promote your activity making the on- the-spot report of WSN adventure project " Exploration for Wisdom " ( conducted September through December ) (refer to the attached sheet of paper ) the start. (Please refer to the "stop-on-the way" information .)

• Annual Schedule
  
  
  • Start of Project Circle (from May 22 to the end of May)
    
    Let's upload with WSN yourself-introduction and your image of the meals of 100 years after!  Each participating group is requested to send its self-introduction (of school, area, and participating group) and its image of the meals of 100 years after by e-mail to WSN.
    
    
  • June
    
    Food is our source of energy! 
    
    What kind of energy�c please research it. Both open-air fire and cars can operate only when the source of energy is provided.  The same for human being and plants and animals.  We can live as human being just when food is provided. And according to the quality of energy, the life span of open-air fire, cars, plants and animals, and human being are fixed respectively.  We thoroughly research our own meals that become our source of energy thoroughly and learn our own food life. We research our school meals, lunch, foods we buy at stores, and foods we raise. �¨ Please try to grow plants and breed animals by ourselves.  (Please refer to "Let's grow," which will be touched upon later.)
    
    *We research our foods for a week. Each participating group research the nutriment of our foods (of breakfast, lunch and dinner) and make a graph.  Recording sheet for foods is prepared by our secretariat office.
    
    
  • From June to July
    
    Where our energy (food) is from?
    
    *Please research where the food materials of one dish are from.  Just from ONE dish, we can find that various food materials are from all over the world or that some materials are grown or caught only in our area.
    
    *Where, how and by whom the foods are grown or produced? We may pursue it to the participating groups in other countries or may find our way to our own area at last.
    
    *Let's make a world food map. Let's try to write in the result of our researching food materials of one dish.  You may send it to WSN, that completes a world food map on WSN website.
    
    What kind of foods are good to make ourselves work well? 
    
    Let's research the safety of our foods. Where, how and by whom our foods are grown or produced?  Is it varied according to our habitation? By researching those points, you will find several problems on foods.
    
    *Let's check whether our foods have the following kinds of danger: agricultural chemicals
    
    
    • gene recombination
      
      
    • additive
      
      
    • dioxin
      
      
    • trash pollution
    
    
    *We make presentation what kinds of foods are safe.
    
    
  • From September to December
    
    

    Please learn from the wiser on foods.
    
    Let's try to look for the wise persons who seek safety foods being based on the current situation and the safety of foods.  We make a hypothesis about our ideal meals by means of our experiences and our ideas for safety foods.
    
    *Let's make use of "Wisdom Reports" and think about the wisdom for food. Please look for various ideas which support foods within your area.  There are many kinds of foods in rice paddy, fields, supermarkets, and convenient stores.  Please introduce where the wise persons live and how they put their ideas into practice.  (Please refer to "Make use of WISDOM REPORTS," which is treated later.)
    
    

  • December to the end of January
    
    Can we change our food life? 
    
    We could find out our ideal meals.  As the next step, please try how much we can change our food life actually.  Let's make ourselves be the wiser for foods.
    
    *Safety foods week Each participating group tries to eat "only safety foods" for a week.  And those group discuss together about their findings and opinions.
    
    *Making of "Cook Book to keep our life as human being" Please collect recipes containing the wiser ideas for foods and make a cook book bearing those wisdom with other members of WSN.
    
    Summarization
    
    Looking back for this year, please think about the safety, the nutrition, the roots and the wisdom of foods and then sum up your opinions about how future foods should become as "Future Foods" Declaration. How about drawing your image for the meals of 100 years after again? Are there some differences from your first image? Please make presentation on this matter at WSN international symposium next February.