The amount of damage caused to crops by wild deer in Japan is said to reach up to 60 billion yen annually. It seems that 600,000 deer are culled each year in an attempt to mitigate this damage. Some of the culled deer are served in restaurants as game cuisine. But what about the rest?
The company we interviewed this time, A.I.C., operates the game leather brand Portierra, which deals with the hides of culled wild deer. Originally dealing with cowhide, the company seems to have shifted its focus towards solving societal issues like the one mentioned above. They are also committed to being ethical and sustainable, and actively work to promote these values.
Why have wild deer become such a problem? And what is the appeal of deer leather? We asked Daisuke Miki of A.I.C. to share his insights.
PROFILE
Daisuke Miki
After working in production management at manufacturers and major apparel companies, he is now handling leather sales at A.I.C.
The Presence of Wild Deer
Could you tell us about your company's activities?
We are a new entrant in the tanning industry, which originally dealt with livestock leather, but now specializes in wild animals. Our brand 'Portierra' deals with game leather, tanning and selling the hides of deer hunted mainly for sport.Our headquarters is in Tatsuno City, Hyogo Prefecture, and we collect raw hides not only within the prefecture, but also in neighboring Tottori and Okayama prefectures.
Is there a reason for locating your base in Hyogo Prefecture?
Tatsuno City in Hyogo Prefecture is not very well known, but it's actually the largest producer of cowhide in Japan. Tatsuno's leather tanning is a traditional industry dating back to the Kamakura period, and having numerous leather dealers and factories concentrated in one place is a huge advantage. Leather processing involves many steps, so you need processors who specialize in each of these steps.Also, this old house we're using as an office is actually my father's birthplace. We're using it partly because of my father's desire to help invigorate Tatsuno's industry.
I hear you're handling culled deer. How serious is the damage caused by wild deer?
Lately, the news often reports on damage caused by bears, but the scale of damage caused by deer, through feeding and environmental destruction, is even more severe. Currently, wild deer are proliferating explosively, with 600,000 culled across Japan each year. It's even said that this number would need to double in order to control their breeding.In the rural area where I live, incidents such as deer being hit by trains or fields being damaged by feeding are everyday occurrences. Even if the deer don't come down to human settlements, they can eat the bark off the trees in the mountains, causing them to die standing and making landslides more likely. They're also widely affecting natural vegetation.
The fact that the deer population has exploded to this extent is largely due to changes in our lifestyles. Unplanned afforestation for post-war reconstruction, the disappearance of the forested areas by the mountains (called 'satoyama') due to depopulation, the aging of hunters, and global warming on a large scale, have all created an environment that's comfortable for deer.
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