In August 2025, the Newspaper Department published the first issue of Animal Future TIMEs, a newspaper that communicates the current state of livestock production and animal welfare (“AW”).
The purpose of this newspaper is to provide consumers and livestock professionals with up-to-date information on AW. By keeping in mind a gentle way of communicating, we hope to bring the current situation of livestock animals to many people, including children, and to create momentum in the world for AW. We believe that this will lead to stronger corporate commitment to AW and a revision of the Animal Welfare Law (so that livestock animals will also be protected by law).
The first issue was subtitled “The Future of Animal Welfare” and included information on the current status of chickens, pigs, and cows, as well as how to choose AW-conscious products. In the second issue, we focused specifically on egg-laying hens, with the goal of making the paper so that readers would be tempted to choose heirloom eggs when purchasing eggs.
The newspaper also includes interviews with producers and companies that have adopted AW. When we communicate with the producers and companies interviewed, we can feel their love for livestock animals and their strong desire to see a society that is kind to animals, the global environment, and people. During our interviews, we were also able to meet egg-laying hens. I can say with certainty that if I actually saw cage-raised hens and flat-raised hens, I would definitely choose flat-raised hens if I were a person with a general sense of humor. I feel a responsibility to convey the thoughts of those who cooperated with me in the interview and to communicate the AW option to as many consumers as possible as soon as possible in order to help animals suffering from factory farming.
We also put a lot of effort into asking various facilities to install our newspaper. As a result, we were able to distribute the first issue to a total of 87 facilities and 6665 newspapers as far as we know. The main places of installation are educational institutions, libraries and other public facilities, restaurants and other stores, veterinary hospitals, event venues, etc. As a major achievement, we were able to distribute a large number of copies to educational institutions. Specifically, 5 elementary schools, 6 junior high schools, 2 high schools, and 5 universities, (integrated junior high and high schools were counted in the smaller school category). We also received cooperation from 28 agricultural high schools with livestock breeding departments. Of all the educational institutions, 24 schools distributed the survey to all students or all students in their livestock departments. Many of the schools posted the brochures in all classrooms or placed them inside the school for students to pick up freely. In addition, four agricultural high schools said they would use “Animal Future TIMEs” in their animal husbandry classes.
Here are some of the responses from schools that have agreed to distribute the materials within their schools.
A teacher at a private integrated junior and senior high school for girls in Tokyo said, “Thank you so much! I have always wanted to make a world where animals are happy, and as a consumer I try to do what I can, even if it is only a little, by choosing eggs from heifer farms and dairy products from farms where cows live on pasture, but I have not been able to encourage my neighbors to do so. Consumers must be wise. I hope that our students, who will be responsible for the future of our society, will be able to do so. I hope that the students who will be responsible for the future of our society will be able to do so.
The vice principal of an agricultural high school in Aichi Prefecture said, “We are also working on animal welfare,” and “I would like to distribute it to all students in the agriculture department as well as the livestock department. We would like to see the students’ reactions when we distribute them.
On the contrary, the vice principal of an agricultural high school who did not agree to the installation on campus told us the reason why. He said, “There is no doubt that what is written in ‘Animal Future TIMEs’ (about AW-conscious breeding) is good. But if we use this newspaper in class and the students say, well, let’s put our high school cows on pasture, or let’s stop keeping them tied up and let the cows move freely in the barn…we’ll be in trouble. We do not have the money to rebuild the barn. Furthermore, our neighboring dairy farms are tethered. As you can see in the picture of the tethered cows here. If the students say, well, let’s get rid of the tethered dairies in the area, then we are in trouble. It would affect the whole community.” Hearing this story, I felt that in order for AW to permeate school education and livestock management, it is necessary to change the values and structure of Japan as a whole, not just the desire of individual people in the field that AW is necessary.
For the second issue, we will now begin requesting installations. With each issue, we hope to increase the number of institutions that cooperate with us in installation. As for educational institutions, our goal is big and we would like to eventually distribute it to schools all over the country.
The newspaper club is looking for members who are willing to write and request installation together with us. Let’s change the world together!
