A first exchange between French students from the Lycée Paul Bousquet in Sète and Japanese students from the Lycée Sanyo Gakuen in Okayama.

As part of the “Nature and Culture” project, the Japan and France SFJOs are supporting the initiative taken by Professor Takashi Inoue and the teaching team at the Lycée de Sète: Ms Mimosa and Ms Brown, Mr Petit and Mr Calmette to hold an exchange between French and Japanese students on the topic: ocean pollution and waste management.

This first meeting took place by videoconference and was organised by Ms Kumiko Uehara, SFJO advisor, Misters Takashi Inoue and Stéphane Petit.

Short talks were given in English with good humour and a shared atmosphere. The Japanese students introduced themselves and then briefly described their school environment and hobbies. Then came the French students, who showed the diversity of their training courses: fishing, shipping, ship operations and ship maintenance.

Then the students from the Lycée Paul Bousquet presented their environments: the port of Sète, the coastal area and beaches, the Etang de Thau with its fishing and shellfish farming activities, and the marine park.

They also talked about their actions to reduce waste on the coast and in particular their initiative concerning the “Sea Shore Cleaning Day”, which in 2023 brought together around 200 people.

For their part, students from Sanyo Gakuen high school, and more specifically from the Chireki club (geography and history), described their activities, which ranged from public information to the development of mobile phone applications using geo-spatialization of waste and, where possible, its description and origin.