Mihoko Kashiwakura: Active as the Japan Representative for the Gates Foundation

Everything has been connected since I took the AO entrance exam for SFC. In my application, I wrote about meeting a young girl begging in Mexico when I was six years old as my starting point. I wanted to create a world without poverty, so I wanted to look for answers that could significantly change society at SFC, where I could study diverse disciplines.

I feel like I've finally landed a job that is a direct hit (laughs). I think my previous career was about trying to change how systems work, but now I am able to be involved in the field of social contribution itself.

During my time at SFC, I wondered whether entering the field of international cooperation, such as JICA or the UN, would actually bring about the greatest change to society. The answer I came up with was that first, the economic system must be changed. I thought that understanding and changing accounting and financial systems would be the key to solving social issues, so the first industry I chose was finance.

While working at a securities firm, I obtained a U.S. CPA qualification. While understanding accounting and financial systems, I thought about how to transform them to solve social disparities and environmental problems. Then, I went to study for an MBA at the University of Cambridge.

At that time, Prince Charles of the UK was saying "Accounting for Sustainability"—that we must change accounting to consider the Earth 100 or 200 years into the future. So, in the UK, I studied the quantification of social value in accounting, wrote a research paper, and was able to connect with people in the field of ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) investment.

I believe we must change the definition of the value of money. Current P&L and balance sheets are determined by a single standard of value. However, I hope that in the post-COVID world, accounting will move toward an era where ESG is not outside of financial statements but is integrated more into the variations of corporate value.

The mission of the Gates Foundation is that "all lives have equal value." Bill and Melinda went to Africa before they got married and were confronted with the fact of "inequality of life," where children there were losing their lives to diseases that could be treated or prevented in developed countries. So, it is an organization created with the mission of how to eliminate poverty using their assets.

I work at the Japan office, and what I find very rewarding is that the mission allows us to leverage the power of the Japanese government, private companies, and civil society to deliver a pie of solutions from Japan to the poor in developing countries.

When collaborations with large companies or the government move forward, I am very happy to see results in numbers, such as vaccines for tens of millions of people or products that reach hundreds of people.

Currently, the total grants of the foundation are about 5.3 trillion yen.

The annual budget is about 500 billion yen. However, if we seriously want to solve all the poverty problems on Earth, it is just a drop in the ocean. For that, cooperation from developed countries, the UN, the World Bank, international cooperation players like the Asian Development Bank, and NGOs on the ground is necessary.

Therefore, the mission of the foundation is not to act alone, but to form strategic partnerships with governments, the private sector, international organizations, and NGOs, and to see what kind of impact can be made based on the strategies we create.

During this COVID-19 pandemic, we are focusing most on how to deliver the three-point tool for COVID-19 countermeasures—"vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics"—to developing countries. To that end, the "ACT Accelerator" was launched under the WHO last May, and we participated as a partner, contributing funds and creating the framework.

This is a framework that the world created for the first time during this pandemic, and how to make it run properly is the biggest challenge we are facing now.

The disparity between nations that has emerged with COVID-19 is clearly reflected in vaccine supply. While developed countries have currently secured vaccines for about 2.5 times their population per person, it is only about 14% of the population in developing countries. This is a phenomenon of "my country first" known as vaccine nationalism.

To counter this vaccine nationalism, it is important to create a framework that includes developing countries based on international cooperation and multilateralism.

Regarding vaccines, we created a scheme called the "COVAX Facility" that developing country governments can also join, and the Japanese government was the first among developed countries to step forward. This is something to be proud of. Because Japan stepped forward first while other developed countries were running toward vaccine nationalism, it has now become a large framework with over 190 countries participating.

That's true. However, it is predicted that if vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics do not reach developing countries, Japan will suffer an economic loss of 500 billion yen in 2021, mainly in the manufacturing industry, and 1.36 trillion yen by 2025.

For developed countries as a whole, this will be an economic loss of 16 trillion yen in 2021 and 48 trillion yen over five years (according to economic analysis by the Eurasia Group). The Earth has truly become integrated. In that integrated economy, it has become clear that even if you act with a "my country first" policy, you actually lose out yourself.

Therefore, from now on, thinking about global optimization and global strategy is highly rational economically and also good ethically.

I suppose it's that the current situation in developing countries and the sense of it being a "personal matter" for Japanese people have become very distant. In fact, I think it would be good if people could feel more closely that the industries they work in and the things they consume are already integrated into the global economy, including developing countries.

There are many people from diverse backgrounds. There are those from consulting backgrounds who grind out strategies, experts in infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, HIV, and malaria, those who have developed pharmaceuticals, those who have worked in government agencies for a long time and are skilled in communication, and those who have been on the ground with NGOs and have high expertise in logistics and supply chains. It is truly diverse. Since I had no background in international health at all, the field of medicine and health itself was a new theme for me. If there is something in common, it might be that people who have no problem absorbing new fields are gathered here.

My role is to collaborate with all sectors in Japan and create partnerships in various forms with the cooperation of diverse leaders.

Japan is a country that has gained great trust from people on the ground, and I believe there are many things Japan can do with diplomatic power based on that trust. Also, there are few other countries in the world with wonderful services like Japan's universal health insurance system. The Japanese government has long communicated the importance of Universal Health Coverage to the governments of developing countries and has strived to share that knowledge.

Currently, GHIT (Global Health Innovative Technology Fund), where Dr. Hiroki Nakatani serves as CEO, is a model created by the Japanese government, Japanese pharmaceutical companies, and the Gates Foundation contributing money as a solution for infectious diseases such as HIV, malaria, and neglected tropical diseases that are difficult to profit from in developing countries. This is the world's first model to promote R&D (research and development) for developing countries, and I think it is something to be very proud of.

Furthermore, in the private sector, there are still many technologies, products, and services that only exist in Japan or can only be done by Japan. Also, regarding NGOs, Japanese people often act as coordinators at international conferences and manage things well. I believe there is a lot of potential for Japanese people to be active in such international arenas.

In Japanese-style capitalism, I think the starting point for Japanese managers is the awareness that a company is a public entity of society, or that it creates products and services for the sake of society. Therefore, I think it would be good if they could think more than ever about where the potential to grow corporate value lies, including global issues, rather than just focusing on immediate shareholders and direct stakeholders for post-COVID corporate value and medium- to long-term strategies.

It is no longer about mass production and mass consumption as before; from now on, I think we will shift to seeking the nature of social value based on the premise of finite resources. Shouldn't we pursue such a form of corporate value?

However, I don't think a single company can demonstrate corporate value in broad areas like the social domain. There, I believe that skillfully forming partnerships with stakeholders involved in that area, such as the government and NGOs, will also lead to corporate competitiveness.

Exactly. The role of the foundation is to make advance investments in risks that companies and governments cannot take. For example, the eradication of polio was a difficult challenge of how to deliver polio vaccines to places with unstable political situations.

This year, Nigeria was finally certified by the WHO as having eradicated the wild strain. It's great to have such happy news in the midst of COVID-19. I believe the role that must be pursued precisely because we are a foundation is very large.

I think it's very important to listen to your inner voice saying, "I want to do this." Since we are in a phase where the times are changing this much, I believe that being able to clear up what you really want to do with ideas that can remove fixed concepts will become a weapon.

Looking back, I have crossed various fields without building much expertise in a single field, and I think that has become quite a strength. When times change, a role that connects completely different sectors might be required rather than staying in one field forever.

The same goes for this field of international health, but I don't have much resistance to jumping into a place I don't understand well. If you can perceive that as a field where you can grow, I think an unknown field is a good place for both companies and individuals.

Overseas, the Mita-kai is quite active in various activities. I think it's rare in Japan for a university to have such a rich network outside. I think connecting global society and Japan through the Mita-kai network is a major role.

Also, as a characteristic of Keio, I think there are many people who create new values for a new era. The theme of SFC was "International Students from the Future." I think it's an environment where people have the perspective of creating new things for the next era, and without being bound by existing things, they can imaginatively and innovatively create things they think are "it."

I just loved SFC (laughs). The way of studying was new, and it was a place where everyone had some kind of theme and looked for answers to their own issues from various fields. In my case, the theme was international cooperation and international development, but in addition to that, I think the fact that I was exposed to all kinds of disciplines, starting with finance and corporate theory, is connected to my current career.

As a characteristic of SFC, I think there were many students who were clear about wanting to do something in a certain field. Then, everyone's interests are completely different, but it's very interesting to discuss. SFC was my first experience where learning was purely fun.

I spent a long time on campus, and even if there were no seminars, we would somehow just talk at Gulliver Pond (Kamoike) for a long time. The overnight stays called "zanyu" (staying late) were also fun, and I feel like the time spent staying over while working in groups and having fun with everyone was the most enjoyable.