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- Striving to Build a "Teach and Be Taught" Relationship
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government held a three-day Tokyo Global Partners Seminar, November 16-18. Ten delegates from the world's major cities, Beijing, Berlin, Jakarta and London, etc, who have the general responsibilities of city diplomacy under the authority of their respective governor or mayor, assembled to exchange ideas on how to promote inter-city cooperation.
Currently, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government is energetically developing strategies to make the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics a success, to find solutions to common problems of cities worldwide, and to transform Tokyo as a global city. It is promoting city diplomacy in order to develop better stategies to build a "teach and be taught relationship" with cities abroad. Tokyo's future goal is to expand its circle of associations and cooperation in order to build bridges with 30 world cities by 2020, the year of the Olympic Games.
The Tokyo Global Partners Seminar is a new step in the intiative to forge the city diplomacy that Tokyo seeks, with the objective to promote cooperation through face to face discussions between the key players of city diplomacy.
After conversing with Tokyo Governor Masuzoe during the three-day program, the delegates shared their problems and presented solutions concerning "environmental policy" and "tourism policy". In addition to visiting the future construction sites of the venues planned for the Tokyo Olympic/Paralympic Games and underground regulating reservoirs for flood control, the delegates were introduced to select activities and viewed urban infrastructure which the Tokyo Metropolitan Government is fostering, such as a test drive of a fuel cell vehicle for the realization of a hydrogen society.
Governor Masuzoe commented to the delegates, "Cities are now the force which drives the world. Cities wield their diplomacy as only cities can. I fervently hope that the success of each one of you here strengthens the ties that bind our cities in order to build a bright future for all parties".
Tokyo is constantly implementing measure after measure, having as a driving force its associations and cooperation with cities abroad, with the goal to dynamically transform itself as we move toward 2020. We invite you to re-visit Tokyo to witness with your own eyes a City in dynamic change.
