President, Kyushu University
Director, Kyushu University Institute for Asian and Oceanian Studies (Q-AOS)
Tatsuro Ishibashi
Thank you all for joining us for Kyushu University Asia Week 2023.
Located in Fukuoka, the gateway to Kyushu, our university has long enjoyed a geographical and historical proximity to the rest of Asia. Since our founding, we have prided ourselves on being an institution open to Asia. This geographical advantage has allowed us to amass a wealth of research and educational achievements concerning the region and facilitate initiatives through exchanges with its universities and research institutions.
We established the Kyushu University Institute for Asian and Oceanian Studies (Q-AOS) in April 2019 as a university-wide, cross-departmental organization to leverage these strengths. Q-AOS aims to address current social issues in the Asia-Oceania region and to identify and highlight anticipated future challenges. By doing so, we aspire to broaden our horizons from Asia-Oceania to the world and shape academic fields that focus on long-term visions for the future. The institute transcends conventional academic frameworks, uniting the entire university in research and education. Responding to the needs of regions grappling with specific challenges, we collaborate directly with local communities to identify, address, mitigate, and predict issues. Our efforts to tackle global challenges include collaborating with local institutions with an emphasis on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
In 2021, Kyushu University was selected as a “Designated National University Corporation” and unveiled Kyushu University Vision 2030, which outlines our plan to become a university that drives social change with integrative knowledge, and we remain committed to solving social issues and promoting digital transformation (DX). Specifically, we believe that integrative knowledge—which brings together new learning and ideas from the natural sciences, the humanities and social sciences, and even design—is necessary to solve complex and challenging social issues.
During Asia Week, which centers around the Kyushu University Institute for Asian and Oceanian Studies (Q-AOS), we aim to showcase Kyushu University’s achievements and new developments in Asian studies to domestic and international audiences. We wish to explore, together with all of you, the integrative knowledge needed to build a society that can achieve sustainable well-being by addressing social challenges.
The theme of this year's Asia Week is "A Week to Seek Asia." Spanning six days, it will feature a symposium with eminent researchers from Japan and abroad, research presentations by early-career researchers, an opening event by alumni overseas, and workshops focusing on the issues facing various countries in the region.
This week-long array of events aims to bring Asia closer together and allow its participants to encounter new aspects of the region. We hope you’ll join us.