Hokkaido G8 Meeting Japan 2008

This year the G8 met in Lake Toya in Hokkaido Japan. Once again this summit was surrounded by an excessive and repressive police presence. Many guests invited to talk at the forums beings organised were either detained for hours at immigration or refused entry. Most foreigners reported some level of harassment by police with such guests as

Susan George and Walden Bello were detained for approximately 2 hours at immigration. I personally had the privilege of discussing my plans and actions for my time in Hokkaido with the immigration staff at Tokyo for 20 minutes.

The agenda for this year's G8 meeting focused primarily on climate change as well as the other crises relating to food, financial markets and oil. Many people involved in the counter-summit activities held little hope for what was going to come from the meeting.

Activities in response to the summit started on July 1st with forums and workshops beginning to take place. There were a large number of forums and workshops planned throughout the next 8 days from a variety of organisations and individuals. A conference on Indigenous Peoples was hosted by the Ainu, the traditional peoples of Hokkaido, and focused on the continued networks and solidarity amongst Indigenous people around the world.

The main demonstration on the 5th was very lively and colourful. In typical Japanese fashion the permit for the march specified that it could only take up one lane of traffic and be 4 persons wide. Despite this many groups were present and carried a variety of messages pertaining to the G8. In total around 5,000 people took part. Unfortunately four arrests were made on the day, but these were only for minor charges and those arrested were released later in the day.

AFTINET presented two talks during the trip. One organised jointly through the Our World Is Not For Sale network looked at the role of neoliberalism and climate change. The second was organised through our friends in Japan and related to the role of trade in the food and environmental crises. Both were well attended with around 60 people in the crowd. The latter presentation saw a panel of speakers from within the Asian region including India, Hong Kong, Thailand and Japan.

AFTINET had organised a visit to local farms in Hokkaido and used it as a chance to see the conditions and reality of farmers in Japan. It was also a great opportunity to show solidarity. I found it particularly interesting to talk with the farmers and hear firsthand about what is happening. Many farmers are feeling the effects of rising fuel costs and have to adapt their practices as best they can. There is a rise in the move away from rice cultivation to other crops (mostly flowers in the cases I saw) in order to continue to make a living. This is due to a lowering of support for rice production, making that more commercially viable crops, like flowers, a more attractive option. Farmers are also experiencing changing climate patterns with snow melting earlier but also returning earlier too. The farmers group that I traveled with has mentioned that they plan to come back to Australia in November to continue their campaign against the Japan/Australia FTA.

I owe a great deal of thanks to Ando Takemasa who was so supportive of helping AFTINET get to Japan and have the opportunities that I did.