Peace Winds Japan Annual Report FY2002

Peace Winds Japan
2-11-5 Sakurashinmachi,
Setagaya-ku, Tokyo 154-0015
Japan

Telephone: +81-3-5451-5400
Facsimilie: +81-3-5451-5401
www.peace-winds.org
meet@peace-winds.org

Special Appreciation to
Our Volunteer Translators:
Noriko Inaba
Yoshikazu Hirano
Anna Kojima

Annual Report FY2002 Top
Message From the Chairperson
Iraq and Afghanistan
Mongolia
Indonesia
East Timor
Sierra Leone
Activities in Japan
Focusing on the Future
Major Activities in FY2002
List of Overseas Offices
Time Line
Organizational Structure
Financial Statement for FY2002

PWJ English Top

Activities in Japan

2002, a Bustling Year in Japan as Well

Peace Winds Japan (PWJ) started off FY2002 entangled in an unexpected dispute. This was triggered when PWJ and the NGO Unit of Japan Platform (JPF)* were

barred from a conference they were scheduled to attend. This January of 2002 conference was an NGO assembly attached to the larger "International Conference on Reconstruction Assistance to Afghanistan," co-chaired by four countries including Japan. Just the previous month, PWJ had attended the "NGO Conference in Tokyo on the Reconstruction of Afghanistan" sponsored by JPF. There, the voiced opinion of the need to reflect local Afghans' intentions in the reconstruction process gained great response, heightening our hopes for a joint effort for the reconstruction of Afghanistan. Therefore, the sudden denial of participation to the International Conference was a fierce blow to our team. This disturbance, picked up by the media, eventually evolved into a political issue. Finally, the obscure decision making process of politicians and bureaucrats that had impeded our participation was broadly criticized. Consequently, private, non-profit organizations such as NGOs came to be viewed by the public as a legitimate alternative to the existing system.

For PWJ, this incident became an opportunity to reconsider and scrutinize our own activities. We reconfirmed our goal to persistently pursue professionalism by combining vision, aspiration, knowledge, technical skills and communication competence to achieve high-quality assistance. Also, we reaffirmed the need to have experts in the fields of medical care, agriculture, engineering, logistics, inspection and research, marketing, public relations and accounting, working in unison to sustain and improve the activities of PWJ across the world.

*Japan Platform, or JPF, is a consortium of government agencies, businesses, NGOs, research and development agencies, media, etc., that collaborate in international humanitarian assistance efforts.

Pursuing Aggressive Advocacy Activities

PWJ is very active in advocacy. We work to enhance acknowledgement of the situations that we are confronting, and to gain understanding towards our activities. During the Iraq crisis, PWJ continued to provide activity reports and video images from the Kurdish Autonomous Region in northern Iraq via the mass media and on our website. Such activity was important to PWJ, for although there were many reports on military conditions, there was less coverage on how the people in northern Iraq were living under the calamity of war. PWJ also started to publish email newsletters, offering prompt information on the latest activities and up-coming events.

Opportunities to explain our activities to each individual are crucial, even in the age of mass or on-line communication. During FY2002, PWJ set up many sessions where staff members could report directly to our supporters or to the media on the state of our activities. In addition, many of our staff participated in a number of lectures and symposia organized by schools, corporations, labor unions and civil society organizations. PWJ could also actively join in events such as school festivals, charity concerts or fair trade presentations, thanks to the planning and management by our strong volunteer network.

Efforts were also made to bring in donations from a variety of supporters. Donation and membership fees from corporations and individual supporters are an indispensable part of the funds that sustain PWJ's activities. For us, advertising and direct mailing are important means to reach a wide spectrum of people and to seek further financial contribution. By diversifying payment methods, it is now possible to make donations to PWJ through post offices, banks, or via the Internet.

Peace Winds Shop

PWJ plans, develops and sells a wide range of original products under the Fair Trade Unit's initiative. In Autumn 2002, our online store "Peace Winds Shop" was launched, enabling our website viewers to purchase goods via the Internet. Products such as our 2 lines of Peace Coffee (East Timor and Guatemala) are very popular, while calendars and post cards are also among the best-selling items. The proceeds from the sales are utilized for PWJ's activities.

What Is Fair Trade?

"Fair Trade" means "commercial transactions fair to the producers and suppliers (who are often poor farmers)." Upon the advent of globalization in business, corporations are now facing increasingly intense international competition to reduce production costs. As a result, corporate competition continues to drive down the price of crops and products, relegating poverty-stricken workers in the producing countries to lower wages and greater suffering. On the contrary, fair trade aims to offer appropriate consideration and prices to the producers, relieving them of this unjust practice.