Dear Katherine and Nicola at Micklefield School,

Konnichiwa.
We are LABO Torigoe Party Senior Group. We are students of grade 7 - 11.
We read your report about Operation Noah. It is fantastic that thousands of
animals were rescued by the programme.

We also thought about dams built in Japan. Dams are important because
they impound and provide water for drinking, irrigation, electricity,
industrial use, and so on. They control floods and protect farmland as well.

However, some problems have been pointed out recently. And so several
plans to build a dam are postponed by villagers' objection.

1. There have frequently happened that the whole village was sunk and
that the whole villagers were forced to leave their homes.

2. Nature is destroyed:
* The mountains, trees, and animals are lost.
* The river water quality becomes bad.
* The number of aquatic life decreases.

3. It takes too much time and money to build a dam.

4. There is considerable danger in building a dam.

We are surprised to learn that there have been built about 3,000 dams
including weirs in Japan. Now it is time for us Japanese to think, "Is this
dam really necessary?" Most of us have noticed that a deciduous forest is
a "green dam".

How many dams do you have in South Africa?

Thank you very much for your wonderful report!
Arigato.

LABO Torigoe Party Senior Group