Fukushima mothers' Laboratory

Tarachine - 'caring mother'

By Tanja Houwerzijl

In Iwaki, Fukushima prefecture, a group of women have started their own laboratory, "Tarachine", to measure radiation in food and water. They are all volunteers and they like to call their NGO a Citizens' lab. Every year during the anniversary of the triple Fukushima disaster on 11th March, the women notice that the memories of the disaster and thereafter the threat of radiation is fading in the minds of local people. The initiative to start a laboratory was born out of a lack of transparency with regard to the levels of radiation in the surroundings. Mothers felt stressed about letting their children play outside and about the safety of food and water due to a lack of detailed information from the government. The women of Tarachine took fate in their own hands and received proper training from radiation experts at Universities and bought the right equipment to analyse the results. They test about 130 samples per month, mostly food, soil and drinking water and occasionally a specialised doctor will come in to test children for thyroid cancer. At the end of the day the volunteers would like to give people proper information about the radiation levels in their living surroundings and their food and give them peace of mind with regard to raising children and having a family life after the Fukushima Daiichi power plant meltdown in 2011, located about 20 km away from Tarachine.