Greetings from Dean

School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya University began as Utsunomiya Higher Agricultural and Forestry School in 1922 and celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2022. To date, more than 20,000 graduates have played active roles in agriculture and forestry, as well as in industry (food, manufacturing, finance, services), government, education, and research institutions.

To realize a sustainable, co-creative society, the School of Agriculture is required to cultivate practical human resources such as highly specialized engineers, researchers, and civil servants who have in-depth knowledge in the specialized fields of food production, life sciences, and the environment, as well as the basics of GX and DX and a wide range of skills related to the SDGs.

In 2026, this School of Agriculture will be restructured into four departments: “Department of Frontier Food Science”, “Department of Innovative Science for Bioproduction”, “Department of Environmental System Science”, and “Department of Ecological Ecological Socio-Economics”.

The “Graduate School of Regional Development and Creativity”, which offers a Master's degree in “Division of Engineering and Agriculture” and “Division of Social Design”, offers a wide range of interdisciplinary fields from social design to innovation. Furthermore, the doctoral program, offered by the United Graduate School of Agricultural Science, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, which celebrated its 40th anniversary, and the Utsunomiya University Department of Advanced Transdisciplinary Science, provide a rich research environment, and have awarded more than 430 doctorates to date.

Our faculty provides theoretical and practical education at our Mine Campus (Utsunomiya City), our expansive Affiliated Farm (Moka City), and our Experimental Forest (Nikko City and Shioya Town). The Affiliated Farm serves as a shared educational facility, hosting hundreds of students from other universities annually. Starting in 2024, our Experimental Forest began accepting students from 17 universities for Nikko Forest Field Training.

We also conduct education and research in collaboration with our university-wide centers, the “Center for Bioscience Research and Education” and the “Center for Weed and Wildlife Management”.

As climate change intensifies, addressing food and environmental challenges has become a shared SDG for all of humanity. High school students, your university years are a valuable time for self-reflection and reflection through learning and interactions with friends both in Japan and abroad. We hope you will learn and have fun in agriculture, and aim to contribute to the SDGs and the sustainable and ecological society that lies beyond.

Kenji Yamane, PhD
Dean of the School of Agriculture,Utsunomiya University