APU and Yufu City Signed a Friendship and Exchange Agreement

(Oita Godo Newspaper, January 15^th 2009, morning page 11)

A signing ceremony was held at the Oita Prefectural office to conclude the Friendship and Exchange Agreement between Yufu City and Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University (APU, Beppu City) on Thursday, January 5th 2009. In the future, both parties will deepen cooperation focusing on the fields of international exchange in elementary and junior high schools, tourism, and environmental preservation.

Yufu City, surrounded in a natural environment and blessed with hot springs that both sooth the locals and please the tourists, and APU, aiming to nurture global human resources as an international educational research institution, plan to further strengthen their relationship through multi-faceted exchange projects.

Yufu City Mayor Shuto Hobun and APU President Monte Cassim were present and signed the agreement along with Governor of Oita Prefecture Hirose Katsusada who acted as the official witness.

Mayor Shuto spoke of his expectations, "Yufu City aims to be a city which is both a bright and lively city to live in for the local residents as well as being Yufu City the major tourist area. For this purpose, we want to further develop the city with the aid of APU. I hope that we can deepen our relationships through international exchange, for example, inviting APU students to our city schools and encouraging them to participate in our regional events. I will endeavor so that we can both develop strongly."

In response, President Cassim said, "APU is a university which has developed thanks to the cooperation of the region. Therefore I believe that our role as a university is to return the results of our academic research to the community and act as a bridge linking local knowledge with the international stage. I hope to deepen our relationship with Yufu City even more through, for example, student exchange and research."

APU has made similar friendship and exchange agreements to ten city town outside the prefecture.


Comment: This is a very good agreement as both parties will gain benefits out of this agreement. For APU, it is good that the students will have the opportunities to be practically involved in city revival and tourism projects in Yufu City and other cities. At the same time, the local area will benefit from involving APU students, because APU students consist of a diverse group of young people coming from all over Japan and all over the world, which can help to promote the local area to their hometowns as well as apply the lessons that they learn from being involved in the projects to develop their own hometowns.


NUGROHO Katarina Marsha Utama
Indonesia
APM2, Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University