AP Bank
AP Bank is a Japanese non-profit organization dedicated to renewable energy and environmental projects, founded in 2003. AP Bank's seed money was provided by record producer Takeshi Kobayashi, musician Kazutoshi Sakurai and composer and musician Ryuichi Sakamoto. It channels its finance to small-scale sustainable projects that would otherwise struggle to receive loan funding. Beneficiaries have ranged from a recycling program in the far south of Kyushu, Japan, to the construction of an eco-resort in the Marshall Islands. AP Bank holds its own festival since 2005. AP Bank Fes raises awareness about environmental issues such as recycling and global warming, with all profits from the festival going to fund more projects at AP Bank. History The concept for AP Bank arose out of a series of seminars in 2002 by the members of composer Ryuichi Sakamoto's Artists Power, a project started in 2001 by Sakamoto and Takuro of Glay to engender more financial responsibility amongst musicians. Seminar organiser and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi invited members to learn from experts about citizen's banks, where money is used according to the depositor's wishes as opposed to regular banks where depositors rarely know how their deposits are used. Presenter Yu Tanaka, executive director of