Minister of the Environment (Japan)

The  is a member of the Cabinet of Japan. The minister is nominated by the Prime Minister of Japan.

The current minister is Hirotaka Ishihara, who took office on 21 October 2025.

## List of ministers of the environment (2001–)

|colspan=4|Minister|colspan=3|Term of office|style="width:160px;" rowspan=2 colspan=2|Prime Minister|||||
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|rowspan=2|1|||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Yoriko Kawaguchi|rowspan=2|January 6, 2001|rowspan=2|February 8, 2002|rowspan=2||
|Yoshirō Mori||||||||||
|rowspan=4|Junichiro Koizumi|||||||||
|2||||||||||
|||February 8, 2002|September 30, 2002|||||||
|3||||||||||
||Shun'ichi Suzuki|September 30, 2002|September 22, 2003|||||||
|4||||||||||
||Yuriko Koike|September 22, 2003|September 26, 2006|||||||
|5||||||||||
||Masatoshi Wakabayashi|September 26, 2006|August 27, 2007|||||||
|rowspan=2|Shinzō Abe|||||||||
|rowspan=2|6|||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Ichirō Kamoshita|rowspan=2|August 27, 2007|rowspan=2|August 2, 2008|rowspan=2||
|rowspan=2|Yasuo Fukuda|||||||||
|rowspan=2|7|||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Tetsuo Saito|rowspan=2|August 2, 2008|rowspan=2|September 16, 2009|rowspan=2||
|Taro Aso||||||||||
|rowspan=2|8|||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Sakihito Ozawa|rowspan=2|September 16, 2009|rowspan=2|September 21, 2010|rowspan=2||
|Yukio Hatoyama||||||||||
|rowspan=3|Naoto Kan|||||||||
|9||||||||||
||Ryu Matsumoto|September 21, 2010|September 2, 2011|||||||
|10||||||||||
||Satsuki Eda|June 27, 2011|September 2, 2011|||||||
|11||||||||||
||Goshi Hosono|September 2, 2011|October 1, 2012|||||||
|rowspan=2|Yoshihiko Noda|||||||||
|12||||||||||
||Hiroyuki Nagahama|October 1, 2012|December 26, 2012|||||||
|13||||||||||
||Nobuteru Ishihara|December 26, 2012|September 3, 2014|||||||
|rowspan=6|Shinzō Abe|||||||||
|14||||||||||
||Yoshio Mochizuki|September 3, 2014|October 7, 2015|||||||
|15||||||||||
||Tamayo Marukawa|October 7, 2015|August 3, 2016|||||||
|16||||||||||
||Koichi Yamamoto|August 3, 2016|August 3, 2017|||||||
|17||||||||||
||Masaharu Nakagawa|August 3, 2017|October 2, 2018|||||||
|18||||||||||
||Yoshiaki Harada|October 2, 2018|September 11, 2019|||||||
|19||||||||||
||Shinjirō Koizumi|September 11, 2019|October 4, 2021|||||||
|Yoshihide Suga||||||||||
|20||||||||||
||Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi|October 4, 2021|August 10, 2022|||||||
|rowspan=3|Fumio Kishida|||||||||
|21||||||||||
||Akihiro Nishimura|August 10, 2022|September 13, 2023|||||||
|22||||||||||
||Shintaro Ito|September 13, 2023|October 1, 2024|||||||
|23||||||||||
||Keiichiro Asao|October 1, 2024|October 21, 2025|||||||
|Shigeru Ishiba||||||||||
|24||||||||||
||Hirotaka Ishihara|October 21, 2025|_Incumbent_|||||||
|Sanae Takaichi||||||||||

## Infobox (official post)

- **post**: Minister of the Environment
- **insignia**: Goshichi no kiri.svg
- **insigniasize**: 80px
- **insigniacaption**: Emblem of the Government of Japan
- **image**: Hirotaka Ishihara 20211115.jpg
- **incumbent**: Hirotaka Ishihara
- **incumbentsince**: 21 October 2025
- **department**: Ministry of the Environment (Japan), Ministry of the Environment
- **style**: His Excellency
- **member of**: Cabinet of Japan
- **reports to**: Prime Minister of Japan
- **nominator**: Prime Minister of Japan
- **appointer**: Emperor of Japan
- **appointer qualified**: <small>attested to by the Emperor of Japan, Emperor</small>
- **precursor**: Director-General of the Environmental Agency
- **deputy**: State Minister of the Environment
- **salary**: ¥20,916,000