Minister of the Environment
Emblem of the Government of Japan
Incumbent Shintaro Ito since 13 September 2023
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 attested to by the Emperor
Precursor	Director-General of the Environmental Agency
Formation	January 6, 2001; 23 years ago (2001-01-06)
Deputy	State Minister of the Environment
Salary	¥20,916,000

The Minister of the Environment (環境大臣, Kankyou Daijin) is a member of the Cabinet of Japan and is the leader and chief executive of the Ministry of the Environment. The minister is nominated by the Prime Minister of Japan and is appointed by the Emperor of Japan.

The current minister is Shintaro Ito, who took office on 13 September 2023.

List of ministers of the environment (2001–)

  Liberal Democratic
  New Komeito/Komeito
  Democratic

Minister				Term of office			Prime Minister
#	Portrait		Name	Took office	Left office	Days
1			Yoriko Kawaguchi	January 6, 2001	February 8, 2002	398		Yoshirō Mori
								Junichiro Koizumi
2			Hiroshi Ōki [ja]	February 8, 2002	September 30, 2002	234
3			Shun'ichi Suzuki	September 30, 2002	September 22, 2003	357
4			Yuriko Koike	September 22, 2003	September 26, 2006	1100
5			Masatoshi Wakabayashi	September 26, 2006	August 27, 2007	335		Shinzō Abe
6			Ichirō Kamoshita	August 27, 2007	August 2, 2008	341
								Yasuo Fukuda
7			Tetsuo Saito	August 2, 2008	September 16, 2009	410
								Taro Aso
8			Sakihito Ozawa	September 16, 2009	September 21, 2010	370		Yukio Hatoyama
								Naoto Kan
9			Ryu Matsumoto	September 21, 2010	September 2, 2011	346
10			Satsuki Eda	June 27, 2011	September 2, 2011	67
11			Goshi Hosono	September 2, 2011	October 1, 2012	395		Yoshihiko Noda
12			Hiroyuki Nagahama	October 1, 2012	December 26, 2012	86
13			Nobuteru Ishihara	December 26, 2012	September 3, 2014	616		Shinzō Abe
14			Yoshio Mochizuki	September 3, 2014	October 7, 2015	399
15			Tamayo Marukawa	October 7, 2015	August 3, 2016	301
16			Koichi Yamamoto	August 3, 2016	August 3, 2017	365
17			Masaharu Nakagawa	August 3, 2017	October 2, 2018	425
18			Yoshiaki Harada	October 2, 2018	September 11, 2019	344
19			Shinjirō Koizumi	September 11, 2019	October 4, 2021	754		Yoshihide Suga
20			Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi	October 4, 2021	August 10, 2022	310		Fumio Kishida
21			Akihiro Nishimura	August 10, 2022	September 13, 2023	399
22			Shintaro Ito	September 13, 2023	Incumbent	135