Tokyo – Japan’s Environment Ministry plans to expand the country’s national and quasi-national parks to bolster efforts to conserve biodiversity, officials said.
The move is in line with an international goal of conserving at least 30% a country’s land and oceans by 2030. The Group of Seven major nations and the Group of 20 advanced economies agreed on the goal in 2021.
Currently, Japan protects about 20.5% of land and 13.3% of oceans by designating such areas as national or quasi-national parks, among other measures.
To reach 30% the ministry plans to expand existing parks while finding areas that need to be protected and newly designate them as national or quasi-national parks. It will also utilize forests and green spaces owned by companies, temples and shrines.
National parks are managed by the ministry, while prefectural governments take care of quasi-national parks. At present, there are 34 national parks and 58 quasi-national parks across Japan.
In fiscal 2022, which ends in March next year, the ministry will select candidate sites for expansion and new designations.
Specifically, it will check the ecosystem, geological conditions and land use status of each candidate site, based on data from a nationwide survey conducted between fiscal 2007 and 2010.
After hearing from experts, the ministry will confer with landowners, local municipalities and other related parties in order to give new designations to such natural spaces.
The ministry has already been working to turn Hokkaido’s Hidaka Sanmyaku-Erimo quasi-national park and the surrounding area into a national park as early as this year.
The ministry also plans to further protect the oceanic ecosystems surrounding Japan.
Currently, in most coastal areas designated as national or quasi-national parks, development activities do not require regulatory approval.
At present, there are roughly 50,000 hectares of coastal area in Japan that require regulatory approval before development can proceed. The ministry aims to double that by 2030.
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