Currently, humanity is confronted with various earth-threatening problems, such as over-consumption of energy. The degradation of natural ecosystems as a result of abnormal weather conditions and global warming has also become an urgent global issue. Meanwhile, the decay of social and technological systems that have supported our livelihoods up until the present day has begun to make our very living environments-places which ought to be safe and secure-increasingly dangerous and insecure. Such trends have led to increasing consumer demand for health, safety, security and sustainable comfort. For the International Design Competition 2008, JDF has selected the theme "Earth Life." We welcome diverse unique proposals on products, systems, business models, etc., that will prompt us to contemplate how we should pass on to the next generation the Earth-beautiful, irreplaceable, living planet, the birthplace and foundation of human livelihood-and how to tackle, in our everyday lives, the environmental stresses facing us today and ensure a more sustainable, affluent and comfortable lifestyle. JDF particularly welcomes design proposals that harness the power of design to present an ideal social paradigm of real benefit, and that are based on the concepts of ecodesign, sustainable design, universal design, and biomimicry-discipline that studies and learns from the mechanisms of nature. In order to promote the efficient use of such design proposals in the business community, we have set three specific subthemes.