Dear Members of the Zoological Society of Japan
The 95th Annual Meeting of the Zoological Society of Japan was held from September 12 to 14 (Thursday to Saturday), 2024, at the Bunkyo Campus of Nagasaki University. The number of participants included 791 meeting attendees, 144 high school presenters, over 250 participants in the Zoology Plaza, and 126 attendees at the public lecture. A total of 392 general presentations were given, along with 24 symposia and related sessions (comprising 116 presentations), including the headquarters-sponsored (Narishige) symposium. In addition, 49 high school presentations, 15 Zoology Plaza programs, and 4 public lectures were held. Despite the intense heat, uncharacteristic of mid-September, many people traveled from all over the country to Japan's westernmost tip, Nagasaki, and engaged in lively research discussions from early morning until late at night over the three-day period. On behalf of the organizing committee, I would like to express my sincere and heartfelt gratitude to everyone.
Although this annual conference has a long history, this was the first time it was held in Nagasaki. Perhaps because there are no universities in Nagasaki Prefecture with undergraduate departments or faculties of basic biology, the number of society members, including students, has historically been quite small at around 15. When we were first approached about hosting it, we were quite hesitant, but with the warm support of Kyushu branch members from other prefectures, the Nagasaki conference became a reality. During the event, I felt a strong sense of fulfillment upon hearing many participants say things like, "I'm enjoying Nagasaki for the first time," and "Nagasaki is a wonderful place."
This tournament followed recent trends of being held in so-called regional cities, such as the 92nd Yonago Tournament (which was moved online due to the COVID-19 pandemic) and last year's 94th Yamagata Tournament. Almost without exception, regional cities in Japan are struggling with a weakened state as they fail to put a stop to population decline. Nagasaki Prefecture is also focusing on tourism as a solution to this situation, and hosting events like this tournament with high participation from the younger generation serves as a valuable opportunity for the prefecture to promote itself. Personally, I believe that holding tournaments in regional cities is extremely important in terms of regional revitalization as well. However, as mentioned above, hosting one is nearly impossible without the support of members from neighboring districts, and it will be necessary to establish an implementation framework across the entire branch.
The Nagasaki Convention was truly free from the long-lasting COVID-19 pandemic. We were able to proceed with preparations without having to consider any infection control measures such as masks, hand sanitization, or ventilation. On the other hand, for members who found it difficult to attend in person due to various circumstances, we utilized technology that became established during the pandemic to provide opportunities for online participation. Based on our experience at last year's Yamagata Convention, we consolidated online presentations into a single venue and adopted a method of live-streaming the proceedings of all venues to online participants. While this approach excelled in that it had almost no impact on in-person participants, behind the scenes, communication issues occurred multiple times, causing inconvenience to online participants. We once again realized the difficulty of planning and implementing an academic conference handling hundreds of presentations online without having professional technical expertise.
At the high school presentations, many young people gathered from all over the country, and the poster venue was overflowing with the enthusiasm of both the participants and the audience. What personally impressed me about the high school presentations was the originality of their themes, the use of advanced research and analytical methods that rival those of professionals, and the clarity of their content coupled with excellent design. I am convinced that among them will undoubtedly emerge talents who will support the future of Japanese zoology. The only disappointing point was the low number of participants from the Kyushu-Okinawa region, including the local area of Nagasaki. Recognizing this situation for some time, we had reached out through high school personnel for over a year, but the number of presentation titles did not grow as much as we had hoped. Regardless, we believe it is important to continue outreach efforts in the Kyushu-Okinawa region moving forward, including the high schools that participated this time.
The Zoology Plaza, held as a public event, was a huge success, just like last year's Yamagata conference. We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the exhibitors for their efforts in bringing together a diverse and fascinating array of animals. In addition, thanks to our outreach to the local board of education to request the distribution of flyers to elementary and junior high school students, many families with children visited the event. The open public lecture featured a theme on the close relationship between the fishing industry and zoology, a project unique to Nagasaki, which is renowned for its fishing industry. This also drew a large number of participants from a wide range of generations, and lively discussions took place.
The social gathering was held on a grand scale, welcoming participants just exceeding the maximum capacity of 400 people to a hotel near Nagasaki Station. A wide selection of sake and shochu produced in Nagasaki Prefecture was made available through the special arrangements of a local brewery (Oshima Shuzo). Additionally, while Nagasaki Prefecture has many groups dedicated to the dragon dance (ja-odori), which originated in China and is designated as a national and prefectural Intangible Folk Cultural Asset, this time the Nagasaki University Dragon Dance Club performed for us. I am certain that the banquet was a huge success thanks to their brave and powerful performance.
The whirlwind four days, including setup, passed in the blink of an eye, and as I write this, the campus that served as the venue during the summer break has fallen quiet once again. Please forgive my personal reflections, but the reason I can bask in this sense of achievement is thanks to the tournament having concluded safely and entirely as scheduled. I would like to express my sincere gratitude once again to everyone who worked so hard to make this tournament happen. In particular, we received tremendous support from our sponsoring companies and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, and Nagasaki University, as co-organizer, provided the venue. Furthermore, we received countless forms of support and advice from society officers, including President Terakita and incoming President Shiga, the society secretariat led by Ms. Yuko Sato, and the members of the organizing committee for last year's Yamagata conference.
Next year, the Chubu Branch will be in charge and the event will be held in Nagoya. Hoping that the next conference will welcome even more people than this one and become a wonderful event, we pass the baton to the members of the next executive committee.
Chair of the Executive Committee for the 95th Annual Meeting of the Zoological Society of Japan
Jiro Okada (Faculty of Environmental Science, Nagasaki University)
