Since 1983, Itabashi City has been in a Friendship City relationship with Kuriyama Town (current Nikko City) under the Green and Cultural Exchange Agreement. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of this relationship, Itabashi received 12.7ha of forest land as “Itabashi City’s Forest” in 1993. Approximately 15 years ago, the citizens of Itabashi began planting trees in that forest, in hopes of someday, being able to use these very trees to build public schools in the Itabashi area.

This idea was well received by Nikko City, and the two cities signed a memorandum of understanding in October 2011 (“Memorandum of understanding regarding the use of timber and environmental education based on the Green and Cultural Exchange Agreement”). Through this agreement, Itabashi promised to make an effort to use wood produced in Nikko when constructing or improving public schools while Nikko agreed to provide opportunities for environmental education for Itabashi.

Unfortunately, while the school renovation project was already underway at the time, the trees that had been planted by the Itabashi citizens had not yet fully grown, and therefore could not be used. Thankfully, Nikko generously supported the redevelopment efforts by providing timber, as well as connecting Itabashi to local sawmills and furniture manufacturers, which in turn strengthened the friendship between the two cities.

These environmental efforts, as well as the City’s projects to renovate Akatsuka 2nd Junior High School, are documented in the book, “We started a new way to build schools (Atarashii gakkōzukuri hajimemashita)” published in June 2014.