Students from the Tohoku region devastated by the March 11, 2011, disasters have vowed to draw from their experiences and take on new roles on the global stage.
"We were given opportunities to examine global issues and think about how to address them," Atsuko Arimoto, 17, said in an address at the Sunday closing ceremony of a three-day student workshop in Tokyo organized by an educational fund and a U.S. firm. Students at the workshop mapped out steps to solve water, food and energy issues.
"Now, it is our responsibility to turn the debate into action," said Arimoto, whose family was forced to evacuate their hometown of Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, to temporary housing after the tsunami spurred the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 atomic plant.