Economy
Fed to start tapering bond purchases this year: Bernanke
The Federal Reserve maintains its $85 billion-a-month asset purchase program, but says it could begin scaling back later this year.
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH May 27, 2012
Japan has a role to play in environment and rights issues in Belize
by Stephen Hesse
“The United Nations’ largest-ever conference, billed as a historic opportunity to create a greener future, appears to be going up in smoke.” That was the sobering observation contained in an Associated Press story in The Japan Times of May 13 headlined “Fears of failure ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Apr 22, 2012
It takes a forest, a field and a stream to raise a child
by Stephen Hesse
In 1996, back when the present U.S. Secretary of State was the first lady, Hillary Rodham-Clinton published a book titled “It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us,” which popularized an old African proverb — “It takes a village to raise a ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Mar 25, 2012
A woman of wisdom among the energy mandarins
by Stephen Hesse
Ask me who should facilitate Japan’s energy dialogue and the choice is easy: Junko Edahiro. Edahiro is a highly accomplished author, interpreter, translator, environmental journalist, policy consultant and cross-sector networker. She is also the inspiration behind several of Japan’s top environmental information networks, including ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Feb 26, 2012
Gloom, doom — and Lester Brown's 'Plan B'
by Stephen Hesse
Anyone who has read any of the 50-plus books that Lester Brown has authored or co-authored (in any of the 40-odd languages into which they’ve been translated) might easily imagine him to be another gloomy environmentalist. At least that was the kind of person ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Jan 22, 2012
Changing self and systems for a leaner and greener Japan
by Stephen Hesse
Year in, year out, it never ceases to amaze me what a difference a day makes. In an instant, December ends, January begins, and a miraculous transformation takes place. For the reverent and the riotous equally, midnight wipes the cosmic slate clean. Through some ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Dec 25, 2011
Time for Japan to realize it really is the canary in the mine
by Stephen Hesse
This Christmas Day column is a book review, but it is also a wish and a prayer. The wish is that the book might, even in some small way, contribute to the development of robust and open debate over Japan’s energy future, the options ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Nov 27, 2011
Demand change: an open letter to Japan's rising generations
by Stephen Hesse
If you’re like my 17-year-old, then you probably already know just about everything there is to know, and reading this column you’ll likely just say: “Yeah, right, whatever,” or “So?” But if you have a few minutes, younger readers especially, please bear with me. ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Oct 23, 2011
Only the Japanese public's will can raze that lethal 'village'
by Stephen Hesse
“Of all the places in all the world where no one in their right mind would build scores of nuclear power plants, Japan would be pretty near the top of the list,” wrote Leuren Moret in a “Power and the people” Timeout special in ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Sep 25, 2011
Now is the time for a 'brand Japan' that creates and inspires
by Stephen Hesse
On Sept. 19, just as this column hit deadline, news outlets reported that a massive demonstration was taking place in Tokyo, rallying tens of thousands of people against nuclear power. The next day, in a move that seemingly intended to demoralize this unprecedented expression ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Aug 28, 2011
Is youth's 'creeping passivity' happening by design?
by Stephen Hesse
Last February, I wrote an Our Planet Earth column titled “Don’t give up on Japan’s kids,” noting there that despite all the hand-wringing that goes on about this nation’s young people, my own experience with university students gives me cause for considerable optimism. I ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Jul 24, 2011
What chance a 'free market' would cure all the world's ills?
by Stephen Hesse
An old friend is a successful investment banker who makes more money in a year than I will make in my lifetime. Like many people, though, he would like to make even more. Standing in his way, he believes, are lawyers and environmentalists. If ...
Environment | OUR PLANET EARTH Jun 26, 2011
Readers offer 3/11 insights, valuable resources
by Stephen Hesse
As Japan has struggled with the physical and emotional challenges of the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and tsunami of March 11, and the ongoing nuclear crisis that resulted, I have written three Our Planet Earth columns related to those events: one on Japan’s response ...