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The new Japan, pushing toward second place among the industrial powers, is increasingly alarmed that it may end up as world leader in environmental ugliness and pollution. As travelers quickly discover, the serenity of rural Japan is vanishing while the urban environment seems to deteriorate in direct relation to the rising national product. It is against this background that the theme of the Osaka Expo '70, "Progress and Harmony," must be evaluated. A postwar emphasis on production, accelerated by the shortchanging of social obligations, has multiplied factories and jobs while congestion, smoke, smog, noise and pollution have been allowed to grow unchecked.

On a cursory reading, U.S. President Richard Nixon's message to Congress, dealing with the degradation of the country's physical environment and measures for its rehabilitation, gives the impression of a statesmanlike contribution. The pollution problem is enormously complex, and that makes it ideal for partisan political purposes. Improvement will not be manifest on a national scale for years, each party will have ample opportunity to blame the other for the lack of progress. Technical difficulties of cleaning up the environment, air, water, solid waste management, and providing parklands, are enormous.

The article focuses on the problems of conservation faced by people who want to enjoy the beach. Three elements make up a beach: a quantity of rocky material, a shore-line area in which it moves and a supply of energy to move it. Principles involved in the motion of beaches are much the same regardless of the material. There are several changes in opinions about the best way to maintain beaches.

The fine start that the United States conservation officials have made during the past fifteen years toward halting the criminal waste of resources has had a tremendous influence on American thinking. Sobered by several current books and enlightened by the recent United Nations conference on the subject, Americans are now turning their attention to the problem of a better worldwide stewardship of expendable resources. The emotional tension over the question has become so great in some scientific circles that anybody who denies that the world is in danger of coming to an early end through the exhaustion of its resources is immediately accused of being against conservation.

Focuses on the struggle of environmentalists in Silver Bay, Minnesota to shutdown the processing mill operated by Reserve Mining Co. in the city in 1957. Response of the residents of Minnesota to Reserve Mining's operations in the state; Reasons for the opposition of environmentalists to Reserve Mining's operations; Regulations related to pollution control existent in Minnesota in the 1950s.

Comments on the exploitation of the energy reserves in the plains of eastern Montana, Wyoming and North and South Dakota. Key factors contributing to the increased interest of energy companies in prairie coal; Major owners of coal rights in the northern plains; Mineral holdings of the Burlington Northern; Farmers, ranchers, conservationists and environmental groups' formation of a regional coalition called the Northern Plains Resources Council to seek a moratorium on coal development until strict environmental safeguards.

Comments on the environmental policies of President Richard Nixon's administration in the U.S. Expectations that state and local governments, along with the private sector, will play the central role in environmental control; Other political issues that seem to preoccupy Nixon; Implications on environmental policy and politics.

Focuses on problems related to the approval of the construction of a trans-Alaskan oil pipeline by U.S. Interior Secretary Rogers B. Morton. Reasons for the delay in the construction of the pipeline; Objections of environmentalists to the construction of the pipeline; Sources that are capable to supply crude oil to the U.S.; Significance of the Alaskan oil for the U.S.; Views that the environmentalists' objections to the Alaskan pipeline arise from fears that wildlife life-cycle and migration patterns will be disrupted; Opinion that this project has been planned in order to satisfy petroleum thirst of the U.S.

Explores the popularity of home waste disposal devices as an alternative solution to solid waste disposal problems in the United States. Problems with solid-waste disposal techniques in the country; Advantages of home disposal systems over garbage collector; Efforts of the American Gas Association to convince the public and government officials of the advantages of gas incineration; Criticism of the industry's claim regarding the contribution of their products to environment improvement.

Reports on the efforts of industries accused of polluting to seek remedies without sacrificing their investments. Coca-Cola's plan to launch an advertising campaign for returnable bottles; Donations made by glass and can manufacturers to "Keep American Beautiful"; Reynolds Metals Co.'s program to collect old cans and use them for scrap; Controversy concerning soap chemistry; Increased consumer interest in pollution.

This article focuses on the international concern on the death of whales. Conservationists have been saying for years that unless the few nations engaged in the oceanic whaling industry act like sensible farmers, and look after their capital stocks, most of the big whales will be shot out of existence and the industry will go bust. At a meeting of the International Whaling Commission last summer, four nations Norway, the Netherlands, Japan and Russia-refused to agree to restrictions on the Antarctic catches, and the prophecy is now within an ace of reality. .

The U.S. has recently discovered that a sub-nation of paupers is hidden within its opulent structure. During the past year television commentators, newspaper reporters and photographers, sociologists and assorted government agents have swarmed through the Kentucky mountains, and have beamed a panorama of misery into practically every living room in the country. The Cumberland Plateau of Eastern Kentucky is the hard, bleak core of Appalachia, and Appalachia is a huge region of stagnation that extends through parts of nine states from Pennsylvania to Alabama. It is the largest and the best known of the islands of poverty that endure, and grow in the U.S. In the Kentucky hills, dozens of drab little towns and mining camps and thousands of dilapidated shacks stretch up a maze of creeks and hollows. Heaps of junked automobiles clutter the roadsides and incredible quantities of trash and garbage clog the silted streams.

Focuses on various programs to prevent soil erosion in Antioch, Tennessee. Details of uncontrollable soil erosion caused due to the neglect and misuse of land; Reasons for the decline in the quality of land in the region; Depletion of soil because of overgrazing; Increase in floods in many parts of the U.S. due to denuded and eroded watershed conditions; Information about the losses incurred through soil erosion; Soil erosion program launched by the Soil Erosion Service of the Department of the Interior, whose responsibility is to see all government efforts dealing with soil erosion; Involvement of erosion experts, soils experts, agricultural engineers, foresters, agronomists and other specialists in the project, who make careful studies and surveys of all physical climatic, agricultural and economic factors involved.

Reports on symposium on "Institutions for a Post-Technological Society: The Universitas Project" held at the Museum of Modern Art during January 8-9, 1972. Concern of the Universitas project to provide design-solutions to environmental problems; Purposes of the Universitas project; Contributors to the symposium.

The article focuses on putting unjust government policies into effect with little public or U.S. Congressional notice. A perfect example of the technique was provided by the Asset Depreciation Range (ADR), announced on January 11, 1971 at the San Clemente White House. Although this tax gift transgresses the constitutional separation of powers, there is every indication that the Treasury Department is about to issue regulations to enact the ADR system. Three billion dollars is a considerable amount of money, even in this era of astronomical expenditures. It is more than the entire amount budgeted next year for the Environmental Protection Agency. Total U.S. aid to preschool, elementary and secondary education for next year is priced at only $3.6 billion.

The article focuses on the pollution problem generated by different power plants of the big power electric companies in the U.S. West. Ten investor-owned public power companies met and formed an association called WEST (Western Energy Supply Transmission Associates). Under the guise of being the benevolent suppliers of a galloping demand for electric power, WEST members, without fanfare, started to draw contracts for a network of coal-fired plants on the Colorado Plateau. By the time environmentalists realized what was happening, WEST had grown to twenty-four member companies and into one of the biggest electric-power combines in the country. Its members had either built, were building, or had on the drawing boards six of the largest fossil fuel power plants in the world, with the potential to turn the crisp air of the West into a major pollution problem. One of the factors that makes the WEST combine so difficult to stop now is that the contracts the companies have drawn are scrupulously legal.

If the tokenism of the past is used as a standard, the California state legislature has done well by the environment. Considered the liberal leader in conservation among state legislatures, it won its reputation by setting auto emission standards that were somewhat tougher than those of the federal government. That isn't much on which to base a reputation, but in the past it didn't take much, and this year the legislature claims it will do better. In the last three months the rush to pass environmental bills has been wondrous to behold. With the session hardly begun, more than 250 proposals have been dropped in the box. Some are standard bills, such as prohibitions on open burning. Others reflect the new style of thinking that spreads east from San Francisco.

An interview with British science writer John Maddox on his book "The Doomsday Syndrome" is presented. He discusses the reasons why he wrote the book on environmental problems, his argument that the environment is sturdy enough to take a great deal of abuse as in the case of the insecticide dichlorodiphenyltrichlorethane (DDT), and the things that bother him about the whole environmental movement. He believes that the movement has displaced priorities in terms of regulations.

The article presents information on the relationship between U.S. government and private business organizations. It states that governments aid entice business to ask for more and more help. The government also moved into crime insurance in response to an outcry from householders and merchants in crime infested cities. It also helped farmers by approving a three year price support law for wool, wheat, feed grains and cotton. It further states that government is also concerned about consumer protection and environment as U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has set up new air quality standards.

The article focuses on the problems regarding the U.S. obsession with economic growth. It states that as economic growth has been established as a parameter of growth by the U.S., the other important problems including employment, racism and environmental problems are neglected by the government. U.S. president Richard Nixon has acknowledged the problem and has offered a solution involving balanced growth.