Setting Better Standards to handle animals other than cats and dogs Stop making distinctions among animals!

The Act on Welfare and Management of Animals was revised in 2020, which added a new chapter to Article 21 to set better standards to handle animals. We thought we would see great improvement in the animal handling businesses.
However, according to the information we gathered in August 2020, the Ministry of Environment mentioned they had no intention of applying this to other animals than dogs or cats.
Therefore, we, the Animal Rights Center, started to work together with two other groups called Japan Anti-Vivisection Association and PEACE (Put an End to Animal Cruelty and Exploitation) to negotiate with the Ministry.
At the same time, we started a campaign called “#animals left behind” to let the public know how we only protect animals we “love” while disregarding other animals.
With help by a member of the House of Councilors, Ms. Mizuho Fukushima, we were able to meet the Ministry of Environment and received comments that they may consider setting standards for animals other than dogs or cats though they are not sure exactly when they could do so.
We suggested a revision of the Act that’s more effective to reduce animal abuse along with a clear timeline. We strongly demanded including animals other than dogs and cats when they would submit the draft of the revised Act.
As a result, the 57th Animal Welfare Working Group clearly stated they would consider setting standards for animals, other than dogs and cats, including mammals, birds, and reptiles.
We truly appreciate Ms. Mizuho Fukushima who was extremely helpful in the process.

Danger of focusing only on Dogs and Cats

It’s truly celebratory to see improvements in the standards to handle dogs and cats as it was demanded when this Act was about to be revised. However, our demand didn’t stop at dogs or cats, but rather we believed all animals should be protected. Otherwise, animal welfare issues in Japan won’t catch on.
Some parts originally specifying dogs and cats were replaced with the word “animals” in the revised Act as a result. However, we cannot forget one message we heard during the process of this revision.
“We will take care of reptiles later. We must do something for dogs and cats first.”
The Ministry of Environment was influenced by people who make such inhumane comments.
If the standards to handle dogs and cats become more strict while the standards for other animals are still loose, malicious vendors would only start breeding animals that don’t apply to the stricter rules.
They will surely come up with a new system to make money as it’s really easy to make trends in the pet industry.
New challenges will keep arising unless we consider not just some animals but all animals.
This idea applies to animals such as livestock animals and animals for experiments that are not included in the Animal Handling Businesses.
It is discriminatory to protect only animals we love while shying away from those abused by the system.