The Liverness Group (Head Office: Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo; Group CEO: Yukihiro Maru), a British start-up company working to solve marine plastic pollutionIchthion Ltd.The project to collect plastic debris from rivers, operated byGalapagos GuardianWe became a partner of the "Mere Old Man".

Marine plastic pollution is a global problem, affecting marine ecosystems and causing difficulties for many organisms. Toxic pollution is becoming more serious as marine organisms accidentally ingest plastic, resulting in death, and degraded microplastics spread throughout the ecosystem through the food chain. It is estimated that 12 million tons of plastic waste is currently discharged into the ocean each year due to unauthorized human dumping and a lack of understanding about recycling.

Ichthion has developed a technology to collect plastic litter at the river stage, noting that 60-80% of ocean plastic is washed into the ocean from rivers and becomes very difficult to collect once it enters the ocean. Using this technology, we have launched a project called "Galapagos Guardian" to solve the world's ocean plastic problem, and have begun activities in Ecuador, home to the Galavagos Islands, a well-known World Heritage site.

However, the major emitters of marine plastic waste are Southeast Asian countries, many of which are island nations, with the Philippines in first place in terms of annual emissions, India in second, and Malaysia in third. Malaysia, in particular, is estimated to discharge about 91 TP3T of plastic waste, compared to about 0.61 TP3T in China, where the total amount of plastic waste for the country as a whole is about 10 times greater.

Therefore, in order to solve marine plastic pollution in the Southeast Asian region, the Liverace Group has entered into a partnership with Ichthion to support its expansion into Southeast Asia and the expansion of Galapagos Guardian. As a first step of the partnership, Inty Grønneberg, head of Ichthion, will attend theHyper Interdisciplinary Conferenceto communicate to the world the significance of Ichthion's solutions to marine plastic pollution.

In addition, Leave a Nest Malaysia operates an incubation facility specializing in deep tech, calledCenter of Garage MalaysiaThe company plans to open an office in Malaysia to implement Galapagos Guardian in Malaysia, where a high percentage of plastic is discharged into the ocean, and to conduct educational activities to increase understanding of marine plastics.

Through this partnership, Riverness Group and Ichthion will further strengthen their collaboration and work together to promote effective measures to solve the marine plastic problem.

About Ichthion
Ichthion Ltd. a spin-off company from Imperial College London, is focused on preventing plastic from entering coastal waters and developing technologies to recover plastic from the ocean. The Azure system they have developed aims to remove plastic waste from rivers and prevent marine pollution, and they have implemented several plastic recovery projects in Ecuador. The relationship between Riverness Group and Ichthion began in 2018 when IchthionTECH PLANTER 2018 UKIt began with his selection as a finalist in theIn 2024, Liberace Capital invested in IchthionThe company is doing so.