Speaker

About the speaker: 

Brian Tsuyoshi Takeda is a Japanese-Canadian entrepreneur and environmental innovator, dedicated to marine ecosystem restoration. Before co-founding Restorae, he was the founder of Urchinomics, a pioneering restorative aquaculture venture that restored kelp forests through the valorization of overgrazing urchins.  Takeda also serves as Head of Reforestation at the Kelp Forest Foundation, a Netherlands-based nonprofit dedicated to advancing kelp research and restoration globally. In April 2025, Takeda was appointed as the Secretariat of International Affairs for the Japan Blue Economy Association (JBE), a research cooperative authorized by Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. In this role, he collaborates with international policymakers, regulators, scientific institutes, industry leaders, and civil society to facilitate knowledge sharing around Japan’s successful blue natural capital credit market, known as J-Blue Credit®. This market, which recognizes wild and farmed kelp as part of blue carbon ecosystems, has established the world’s first blue natural capital market, with credits trading at prices significantly higher than other similar carbon initiatives.

Company info:

Restorae AS develops and invests in ecologically restorative technologies and business models.  Alongside this, Restorae AS supports mission-aligned initiatives like the Kelp Forest Foundation, Japan Blue Economy Association, as well as Blue Forest and Blue Rewilding restoration R+D projects. 

Presentation:

The speaker plans to present the general design of the J-Blue Credit for policy makers, while also highlighting how the credit mechanism also enables co-design, co-creating and innovation particularly for the seaweed industry. Then he plans to highlight some of the lessons from this pioneering experience, and how it could influence policy for other nations looking to catalyze seaweed production.