 Okay, welcome to Think Tech Hawai'i's 2021 Holiday Party and annual awards program. This year, like last year, we come to you virtually. Thanks for joining us. It's so nice to have you here, and thanks to the law firm of Clay Chapman, Iwamoro Police and Nervell for sponsoring this holiday event. Our Olio Loha this evening will be given by Melody Kapilio Loha-McKenzie, Professor of Law Emerita at the William S. Richardson School of Law. Aloha mai kākou. This evening, I would like to present an Olio Loha written by Aunty Pilahi Paki with the lay of the voice by Aunty Lani Kalama. And it basically talks about leadership in Hawai'i requiring aloha. The state law encourages all of us, but particularly those in positions of authority, to apply the aloha spirit and recognizes that spirit was the working philosophy of the Native Hawaiian community, which was presented as a gift to the general community. The law defines aloha as mutual regard and affection with no obligation in return. And the essence of relationships in which each person is important to every other person for collective existence. Aloha requires courage and perseverance, and ultimately it requires principled action. Aloha mai kākou. This evening, I would like to present an Olio Loha written by Aunty Pilahi Paki with the lay of the voice by Aunty Pilahi Paki with the lay of the voice by Aunty Pilahi Paki. Aloha mai kākou. Aloha mai kākou. Aloha mai kākou. Aloha mai kākou. Mahalo newy melody that was very inspiring. 2021 was a busy and very productive year for Think Tech. And as for many of us, it was also a very challenging year. So our first order of business tonight is to take a look back. Here's a movie our staff made to help us get nostalgic. This year's special keynote speaker is Dr. Charles Chip Fletcher, Climate Change Scientist at UH's School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, SOAS, and Chair of Honolulu's Climate Change Commission. Dr. Fletcher was also a featured faculty member in the documentary film we made this year to examine the connections between climate change and COVID. It's called Spiraling Crisis. The Alarming Convergence of Climate Change and Pandemic. Good evening, happy holidays to everybody. I've just returned from two weeks at the UN Climate Conference, COP26 in Gloucisco, Scotland. COP COP stands for Conference of Parties. They occur annually and the first one was held in 1995 in Berlin. COPs are conferences where nearly 200 nations work out agreements to stop climate change. Six years ago, countries came together in Paris for COP21. That meeting resulted in the Paris Climate Accord, which committed the nations to limit the global average temperature rise to well below 2 degrees Celsius or about 2.6 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. It also included language to push for a more ambitious goal, 1.5 degrees Celsius or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit. The difference between the two targets may seem small, but in fact they represent vastly different levels of effort for countries seeking to limit their greenhouse gas emissions and strikingly divergent outcomes for the planet. For instance, a recent study by the United Kingdom Met Office, Britain's National Weather Service, found that 1 billion people could face heat stress, a potentially fatal combination of heat and humidity if temperatures rise by 2 degrees Celsius. Some experts doubt that stopping warming at 1.5 degrees C remains achievable, and this may be true. In fact, a UN report recently concluded there is a 50-50 chance that global warming will exceed 1.5 degrees C in the next two decades. And unless there are immediate rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, limiting warming to 1.5 C or even 2 degrees C by the end of the century will be beyond reach. One study calculated that the Pledge or Promises made by the nations in the 2015 Paris Accord provided only an 8% probability of living warming to below 2 C and a 0% probability to below 1.5. But the Paris Accord included a mechanism for ratcheting up pledges, and the most recent pledges at the time of the Glasgow meeting a few weeks ago increased the odds to 34% for keeping warming below 2 C, and 1.5% probability to keep warming below 1.5 C. Unfortunately, what is pledged and the actual policies followed by nations are two different things. Pledges made by the time of the Glasgow meeting, if followed, would provide a two-thirds probability of limiting warming to about 2 degrees C. But at a 90% probability, current pledges would yield 2.4 to 2.5 degrees C of warming. However, at a 66% probability, the actual policies which have been announced and legally put in place by individual nations and are followed put us on a path to 2.8 degrees Celsius and over 3 degrees Celsius if we look at a 90% probability. 3 degrees C of global warming would make one-fifth of the world's lands unlivable. Today these lands host one-third of humanity, and at that level of warming would force the largest migration in human history with devastating consequences for global security, our socio-economic system, national sovereignty, and it would likely turn most border areas into conflict zones. Increasingly at certain times and in certain places, Earth is already becoming unlivable. It has been said that 1.5 degrees C is not an arbitrary number. It is not a political number. It is in fact a planetary boundary that we must not cross if we wish to preserve a safe future for our children. Allowing temperatures to rise by more than 1.5 degrees C vastly increases the risk of irreversible changes. For instance, the Arctic Earth's refrigeration system will likely lose its summer sea ice with dire knock-on effects on the rest of the climate, as the loss of reflective ice increases the amount of water the heat absorbs in a feedback loop that would rapidly accelerate global warming. The Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets and sea level rise could be tipped into a state of irreversible acceleration beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius. Already we see a set of global biophysical systems that have developed trajectories leading to severe impacts. These include loss of coral reefs and permafrost, changes in atmospheric circulation and the ocean conveyor belt system, increases in extreme weather including heat waves, drought, floods and hurricane intensity, and increases in marine heat waves which are especially problematic here in Hawaii. Under current climate policy pledges, children born in 2020 will experience a two to seven fold increase in extreme events, particularly heat, compared with people born in 1960. Our world will heat up to a blistering 2.8 degrees Celsius by 2090, and for children born in 2020 versus those born a decade earlier, they will experience seven and a half times as many heat waves, about 30 heat waves in their lives, in other words roughly every other year or so, 3.6 times as many droughts, 3 times as many crop failures, 2.8 times as many river floods, and 2 times as many wildfires. These results highlight a severe threat to the safety of young generations and a call for drastic emissions reductions to safeguard their future. Achieving the 1.5 degrees Celsius target requires finding mechanisms of fossil fuel decline that far extend beyond historical experience or current pledges. Examples of historical episodes of fossil fuel decline in 105 countries between 1960 and 2018 shows that there has been no precedent for the rate of coal and gas power decline needed to limit climate change to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The most rapid historical cases of fossil fuel decline occurred when oil was replaced by coal and gas or nuclear power in response to the energy security threats of the 1970s and the 1980s. But I am optimistic. In fact, the word crisis has a second less well-known meaning from the original Greek. It means a turning point, an opportunity. There have never been as much innovation, investment, and interest in green technology. The revolution and renewables which have soared from a niche interest 30 years ago to a cheap global alternative energy source that provides more than one quarter of the world's electricity is one of humanity's most remarkable achievements. Positive technological trends are accelerating. Between 2009 and 2019, the cost of solar and wind power has declined by 89% and 70%. All over the past three decades, lithium-ion battery prices have gone down about 97%. And thanks to clean energy and efficiency, it's now possible for countries to grow their economies without growing their carbon emissions. Heat pumps and hydrogen are becoming household words, if not quite yet household appliances. Batteries, zero carbon ships and aviation, meat-free food and electric vehicles, and other emissions cutting technologies are all still in their infancy and full of potential. Businesses and consumers are showing a new willingness to transform the energy and transportation systems, agriculture, and community design. At Glasgow, 100 countries announced an agreement to cut methane emissions 30% by 2030 and close a glaring gap in climate policy. They also reached a broad agreement to end deforestation in the same time frame, including pledging funds to back it up. In fact, deforestation produces about 10% of the world's carbon emissions. The private sector has committed to align $130 trillion with the goal of net zero emissions in all of their investments by mid-century. People take their cue from the government, from policy, from binding commitments. Now we need politicians to play their part too. In fact, the fate of billions rests in their hands. Thank you. I want everybody to have a wonderful holiday season. This is the pivotal decade of all of human history, and we have abundant reason to go into the holidays with a great deal of optimism. So I wish you all peace, happiness, and a safe new year. Take care. Thank you, Chip, for all your help, for your timely and important keynote remarks, and for all the work you are doing on this critical and existential threat to Hawaii and the planet. Every year we have the pleasure of recognizing organizations and individuals of merit who have made contributions to our community, our society, and our collective well-being. Our community service awards sometimes honor organizations that are not necessarily in the news, but that nevertheless bring notable value and focus to our community on a variety of issues and events. Today we honor three such organizations. We are also presenting ThinkTech Family Awards to one ThinkTech Talk Show series, two ThinkTech hosts, and a ThinkTech underwriter, all of whom represent the best of ThinkTech over the past year. We wish we could honor and we do honor all of our volunteer hosts and their shows, as well as all of our cherished underwriters. So let's start with our community awards. Our first 2021 Community Award winner is the Hawaii Agricultural Foundation, created in 2007 to promote and encourage farming and agriculture in Hawaii. With its education and outreach programs, HAF works on making better, stronger connections among farmers, the agricultural sector, and the community in general. Here to represent the Hawaii Agricultural Foundation is its Executive Director, Denise Yamaguchi. Aloha and happy holidays. On behalf of the Hawaii Agricultural Foundation Board and staff, thank you for presenting our organization with the ThinkTech Hawaii 2021 Community Service Award. Our mission is to promote and sustain Hawaii's agricultural industry by connecting farmers to our community and our community to those in the agricultural industry. Over the past year during the pandemic, Hawaii Agricultural Foundation saw a need to support the food service industry, which includes restaurants and hotels, when the pandemic shuttered our visitor arrivals and closed in their dining. In a matter of four days, our team, along with partners and other volunteers, stood up the Food of Global website, which listed all restaurants open for takeout delivery and our curbside pickup. With confusion over what was open or closed, the Food of Global campaign became the lifeline for many food service businesses and restaurants. You may ask why did Hawaii Agricultural Foundation choose to do this and what does it have to do with agriculture? Well, food service and our restaurants play a vital role in not only feeding our community, but also buying from our local farmers, ranchers, and fishermen. Many of our farmers had to pivot from food service to food retail and or donating their product to those in need as you witnessed during the initial days of the COVID closures. The pandemic has shown our community the shortcomings of our fragile food system. Beyond Food of Global, Hawaii Agricultural Foundation provides technical assistance to farmers, works with the Department of Education to encourage students to consider agriculture as a career, we serve over 5,000 students, and creates educational opportunities for our community to learn about agriculture through programs like local issues and eat, think, drink. With 90% of what we consume being imported, it is imperative that Hawaii and our people make critical choices if we want to become more food sustainable. There's so much more in funding, education, awareness, and assistance that needs to be done and we are proud to be a small part of this very large endeavor in support of our local ag industry. Once again, thank you for the recognition. We're humbled to receive this honor. Thanks so much Denise, as the ravages of the pandemic and climate change and the deterioration of our supply lines continue to remind us Hawaii agriculture and the need for local sustainability are more important than ever. Our next community service award goes to the Pacific Asian Management Institute at the Schuyler College of Business. PAMI was founded in 1977 by the late Dr. N. H. Paul Chung and is a Center for Asia Pacific and International Business Programs, including a well-known annual lecture series on U.S.-Asia relations. Representing PAMI is Professor Shirley Daniel. Happy holidays everyone. This is Shirley Daniel from the Pacific Asian Management Institute at the Schuyler College of Business. We are indeed pleased and honored to have received this community service award from Think Tech. Over the years we've enjoyed a great partnership with Think Tech who always helps us get our message out to our constituents. Our mission is to try to provide international education to our students, the community, and the world at large. And Think Tech has just been a great partner, particularly during the pandemic. We normally have an annual luncheon where we have a distinguished speaker speak to a group of people over lunch. But with the pandemic we were unable to do that and it was just wonderful to have Jay and his team help us to do the virtual Paul Chung Memorial lectures for the last two years over the Think Tech platform. And it was so amazing because through the Think Tech platform we could have a variety of speakers from the mainland that we normally probably couldn't have brought to Hawaii. And even more importantly, we could involve more and more people from the community. So over the last two years we've been able to get over 100 participants in these lectures that focused on the U.S.-China relations and other topics. I also want to thank the speakers who participated in those lectures and I would encourage everyone to go online. You can find them still on Think Tech if you look under the Paul Chung Memorial lecture. And that is again one of the great things about working with Think Tech is that the event is memorialized for those who cannot attend on the day of the lecture. And again, I really want to thank Think Tech for all your support over the years, even before the pandemic, but especially during the pandemic. And I want to thank all my team and everybody who's helped make these lectures a success. I want to thank my colleagues at the Scheidler College of Business for all of their support over the years of the Pacific Asian Management Institute. And I wish everyone a wonderful holiday season in 2021 and we're all hoping for the best and brightest for 2022. Aloha. Thanks so much, Shirley. Tammy certainly raises our awareness on America's critical and delicate foreign policy and foreign relations in the Asia Pacific region. Our third 2021 Community Service Award recipient is Volunteer Legal Services Hawaii, now celebrating its 40th year in providing pro bono services to our community. VLSH's 200 volunteer Hawaii attorneys contribute free legal services in bankruptcy, landlord, tenant, small claims, will preparation, divorce, adoption, advice to veterans, and much more, the Hawaii people who cannot otherwise afford to hire an attorney. Accepting the award is Board President Trevor Assam. Thank you to Think Tech for this honor. Over the last 12 months, Hawaii has struggled not only with the pandemic, but also with its impact on families and the economy. This period has demonstrated the importance of our community and ensuring that we're there for one another in times of need. Volunteer Legal Services of Hawaii has been there for our community. We have served over 700 clients providing legal services free of charge. We have helped veterans with benefits, assisted families in custody and guardianship matters, drafted wills, and assisted tenants facing eviction. In response to the pandemic, we've also moved many of our services online, helping to develop the Hawaii online pro bono program to expand our reach and meet clients where they are. I'd like to recognize our staff, including past Executive Director Angela Minne and Acting Executive Director Grant Teichman, each of whom has worked tirelessly for the organization and to ensure that Hawaii's residents continue to have access to our justice systems. Thank you for this honor, and congratulations to the other recipients. Thank you so much, Trevor. Increasing legal access, especially during this past year, has been crucial, if not lifesaving, for so many people in Hawaii. Now our Think Tech Family Awards. Our first Think Tech Family Award is for the show of the year. This year, we proudly present that award to Looking to the East, hosted by Steve Zercher, Management Professor and Dean of the Asian Studies Program at Kanzaigadai University at Osaka. Steve broadcasts his show from Japan with guests from all over the world, covering topics that reach far and wide. His approachable style and thought-provoking discussions help us understand larger issues affecting Japan, Asia, the US, and the world. I'm Steve Zercher. I'm the host of Looking to the East on Think Tech Hawaii. I want to express my sincere gratitude to the staff and management at Think Tech Hawaii for selecting my humble show, Looking to the East, as show of the year for 2021. It was a complete surprise this election, but again, I'm deeply honored. I started this about two years ago, actually a J's suggestion since I live in Japan and he's very interested in global coverage, discussion of many international issues. So that's exactly what I've done. I'm mostly focusing on Japan, looking at Japanese politics, Japanese sports. One of my most highly rated shows was on Shohei Otani, who is now the MVP for the American League and American Baseball. I did a show recently on Japanese mental health and it's been a great joy. I particularly appreciate the support of the staff at Think Tech, the engineers who helped me with this show. Overall, it's been a wonderful and very smooth experience. So once again, thank you very much to all of you at Think Tech Hawaii and thanks to the other hosts of shows as well for making Think Tech Hawaii so interesting overall. Appreciate it. Congratulations, Steve. Your international perspective always brings refreshing ideas and we look forward to your future shows. Looking to the East is broadcast live every other Monday at 1 p.m. We are presenting two Host of the Year awards this evening. Our first host of the Year award goes to Catherine Norr, host of the show The Wide World of Esports. Catherine is a business attorney, author, and frequent speaker on sports law. Her show brings notable guests from every background and every venue in the esports world of multiplayer video game competition and introduces us to this very exciting high-level, high-tech form of competition. Aloha. I'm deeply honored and humbled to accept this award. Mahalo to Jay, Carol, Hailey, Michael, and Eric and the Think Tech Hawaii team for the opportunity to bring the world of esports to our viewers. Mahalo to Mark Shlove, who introduced me to the network when I was a guest on his show. A special thanks to my constant cheerleader Christine Lenders, the host of Movement Matters. And I must acknowledge Resti Kamori, who consistently has the number one viewed show beyond the lines. Each week I strive to be number two and mostly succeed. I often say that Resti is Michael Felt and I'm Ryan Lochte. Mahalo to the almost 70 guests who have appeared on my show and who have generously given their time to enlighten us about all things esports. I was dreaming of hosting a show about the billion dollar growing esports industry as early as 2019. Six months later, I saw Major General Frank Muth talk about the U.S. Army Esports team on a webinar. I asked him if he would be on my esports show if I had one. Surprisingly, he said yes. I then pitched the wide world of esports to Jay Fidel and happily, he said yes too. My journey began. My mission is to promote people in the esports industry from all over the world. Some of my most memorable shows have been interviewing Fatality, a famous early pro gamer, Will Shark, who only appears by pseudonym and avatar, Hollywood producers Jay and Kim Moses, Artemis team owner Jack Tanvir from India, our own Hawaii Senator Len Wukai, Jeff Weiss of Esports Circus, the hip hop gamer, and venturing into a virtual environment with Dexter Carr Jr. and Aaron Rice. The wide world of esports has been an amazing journey. I humbly thank you for this honor. Mahalo. Congratulations, Catherine. Thank you for expanding our understanding of the world and people of esports. The wide world of esports is broadcast every other Wednesday at 12 noon. Our second recipient of host of the year award goes to Mark Slav, host of Law Across the Sea. Mark retired from the practice of law in Honolulu in 2019, but continues to provide pro-bono services to nonprofits. Over the years, he has helped found many organizations focused on international law, particularly involving China and Japan. Law Across the Sea introduces us to international law, lawyers, and legal matters in general. Mark shares his many contacts with us to promote Hawaii's outreach, and so doing covers a wide range of related topics. Thank you very much for this honor. Being a host on Think Tech Hawaii has given me the opportunity to follow my bliss, meet people in the news, connect with friends, practicing law around the world, and to do programs that are interesting to me and others. My program is called Law Across the Sea, and often involves international law and lawyers from many different countries. I've also done programs about Hawaii, its history, and its music, local politics, and many programs with Hawaii lawyers. I've received a lot of support from Jay Fidel, Haley Ikeda, Eric Calander, and others at Think Tech Hawaii. My good friend Larry Foster and my son, Robbie Shlove, have also suggested many program topics and guests over the years. I'm very grateful to all of them for their help. During my program, I have personally benefited, especially during COVID times, because it has allowed me to socially interact with guests. My guests have always been very happy to join me. I believe that they benefit from being on my program and that they genuinely appreciate the opportunity to discuss matters that are very important to them. Each of my programs has an audience, and all of the viewers have a particular interest in the topic of the particular program they watch. I think it's especially good that our programs are preserved and can be viewed on YouTube or Vimeo forever. I think both the local and international community profits from my long playlist of programs, because our discussions are always easily accessible whenever the interest arises. I'm grateful for the opportunity that Think Tech has given me. Wow. Congratulations, Mark. Your shows have long contributed to our mission of raising public awareness. Law Across the Sea is broadcast every other Monday at 1 p.m. Our last Think Tech family award is to our underwriter of the year, Aylin Ho of Immersive Worlds, LLC. We are deeply grateful to Galen, who has been an unflagging underwriter and supporter of Think Tech for many, many years. As a nonprofit, Think Tech relies on underwriter contributions, as well as smaller donations from donors and friends to maintain our platform and provide our content to the public. Contributions from underwriters like Galen Ho cover the largest part of our budget, and we would not be here celebrating our 20th anniversary without his longstanding and continuing kindness, generosity, and encouragement. Thanks, Galen. Hi. I would like to thank Jay Fidel and the Think Tech team for this underwriter's award recognition. It's been an easy decision over the years to make an annual investment to such a great enterprise. In fact, I can't remember how long it's been since the first inaugural event when Jay first got all of us together to recognize the need for continuing underwriters. I do remember the start in the basement of a building across from Don Quixote store and how we all sat around the table with headphones and microphones and just talked about our interests, just like one would do in a podcast today. And Jay still had his day job. Think Tech has come a long way since then and his contributions to communicating with the Hawaii community is admirable and profound. All of you have so much to be proud of and what you have evolved to and how you've developed a well-oiled organization. As a side note, Jay was part of the SEAT board that created the tech exhibit for APEC 2011. It was through his legal efforts that the nonprofit was created and succeeded. I personally thank him for that creation. Again, thank you for this recognition and for letting me be part of the Think Tech support family. Thank you so much, Galen. Your goodwill and faithful continuing support is central to our effort. We thank of you and all our cherished underwriters every single day. You make what we do possible. Thanks. Congratulations and thank you to each of our award winners. How about a big round of applause for all of you? Thanks for joining us this evening. Mahalo for being with us and for sharing with us on this special Think Tech occasion. We're recording this program, of course, and we'll play this video again on thinktechalai.com. We'll sign up on thinktechalai.com and stay tuned to see it again along with our other great content. Aloha, Nui, Loa. See you again soon.