A plan to reintroduce wolves to Japan more than a century after they were hunted to extinction is gaining traction as conservationists warn that the country’s rural ecosystems are increasingly out of balance and costly to maintain due to booming wild animal populations.
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The Japan Wolf Association (JWA), established in 1993, argues that returning wolves to the wild could restore natural order in the countryside and help curb the billions of yen in agricultural damage caused each year by deer, wild boar and monkeys.
The group is preparing small-scale reintroduction trials in remote regions and downplaying risks to human communities – but not everyone is convinced it’s a wise move, given wolves’ fearsome reputation.
Kunihiko Otsuki, JWA president and heads of a timber company in central Japan’s Nara prefecture, is convinced that reintroducing the apex predator is the right course of action.
“Wolves went extinct in Japan more than 100 years ago but now deer have become a huge problem for farming communities across the country,” he told This Week in Asia. “They eat crops and the natural vegetation in the mountains, and we believe reintroducing wolves would help bring the natural balance back.”
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Japanese farmers also have to put up with troops of marauding monkeys that can quickly lay waste to particularly appealing crops, as well as boars that dig up root vegetables.