On June 30, a total of fourteen Gifu University executive members including President Hisataka Moriwaki, executive directors, vice-presidents and auditors, joined the 9^th Local Business Inspection Tour. This tour is organized by Gifu University in order for the University to contribute to promotion of regional businesses, and to deepen understanding about local business activities in view of creation and development of attractive work for the University students in the future.

The tour participants visited two companies; Kawai Lime Industry Co., Ltd. and NABEYA Co., Ltd., both of which are well-known as major manufacturers in western Seino Region and Gifu City respectively. Many alumni of Gifu University have been working at these two companies. After inspecting the factories, the participants exchanged opinions with presidents and engineers of the companies.

In Kawai Lime Industry, President Shinichi Kawai presented the overview of the company, and then one of the University alumni who is working at this company gave the following explanation concerning the company's ongoing efforts: in addition to manufacturing and sales of lime products, the company is actively conducting many R&D projects for new functional material products by taking their potential use in multiple business fields into account.
Next, the participants observed pulverization equipment and incinerators at the lime pulverization factory, the lime incineration factory and the lime manufacturing factory. At a demonstration of a flat panel speaker which is still under development, the participants were amazed at the level of perfection of the speaker. Kawai Lime Industry is aspiring to put this speaker into completely, new markets in the near future.
In NABEYA, President Tomohiko Okamoto made a brief presentation about the company, which was followed by the engineer's explanation of jigs, a major product of the company. Later, the participants were invited to observe the process of melting metals, a traditional procedure still be taken at casting factories in Japan. They also inspected the jig manufacturing factory capable of dealing with made-to-order products.

The two companies have a long history of business operations in Gifu Prefecture, and both are putting strong emphasis on preserving traditional techniques and developing human resources. At the same time, they are very enthusiastic about developing and researching new materials, new technologies and entry into new markets. All the participants felt their strong commitments to their business operations and future development.
Gifu University is currently promoting the government's Center of Community (COC) Program with an aim to foster human resources that the community truly needs, and to encourage the youths to take root in the region. In this respect, it is believed that visits to local businesses by the University's executive members are of significant importance. They will help the University officials understand the status of local businesses and make many discoveries about them.

Gifu University will continue to organize the local business tours for human resource development and support for the University students' job searching activities.