An extra seminar for the Workshop on UNESCO Man and Biosphere (MAB) Programme and Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) was held on Zoom on April 4, 2022. The speaker was Prof. Yoko Fujikake (Dean of College of Urban Sciences) and Mr. Masaru Eto (B4 student at Prof. Fujikake’s lab) and the title of their lecture was “Paraguay Rural Development & Bio-toilet Project.” The content was about the long-standing support activities for rural areas in Paraguay as a JICA Partnership Program “Improving Living Conditions for Rural Women in Paraguay — Spinning a Dream Together from Yokohama” (https://sdgs.ynu.ac.jp/projects/jica-paraguay-en/) conducted by Prof. Fujikake and the plan to popularize bio-toilet in rural Paraguay, which suffers from drought and water shortage by Mr. Eto. The lecture was held in Japanese. Twelve people including Prof. Miguel Clüsener-Godt (in Paris), Prof. Fumito Koike and many students in Prof. Fujikake’s lab as well as Dr. Xu Xiaodai from China participated in this seminar on line led by Prof. Hiroyuki Matsuda (Graduate School of Environment and Information Sciences). After the lecture of about 30 minutes, a lively discussion continued about 30 minutes. It was a fruitful seminar. The lecture slides were distributed to those who could not attend due to unavoidable circumstances.
