On May 13, Minister of Environment Sakihito Ozawa received a courtesy call from a Japanese-American delegation at the Ministry. The meeting was also attended by Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment Nobumori Otani.
Ozawa welcomed the delegation, and went on to explain that since the advent of the Hatoyama administration, the government had introduced ambitious targets for reducing CO2 emissions, and stressed that these targets were capable of realizing environmental measures coupled with economic growth. He added that cooperation between Japan and the United States was important for a range of environmental problems including the issue of global warming, and expressed the hope that Japanese-Americans active in US society would be able to take the lead in forwarding such efforts.
Delegation members commented that it was well-known among Americans that the Hatoyama administration had set extremely high emissions targets, and interest in environmental issues was high in the state of California, which had a high proportion of Japanese-American residents. They added that they would like to support efforts by Japan and the US to cooperate in combating such issues.
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