TOCHIGI, Aug. 18 — The government of Tochigi Prefecture has made August the month to campaign for increased consumption of Tochigi-made milk and dairy products among its residents.
Every Friday in August, around 30 officials of the prefectural government’s livestock production promotion division which leads the campaign wear a Holstein pattern shirt to work.
They also decorate their laptops with Holstein pattern stickers and send out messages in various places to encourage people to drink milk.
Tochigi is Japan’s No. 2 milk producing region after Hokkaido.
The Tochigi government launched the campaign to raise people’s awareness of the dairy industry during summer when consumption of milk tends to decline.
They are organizing events such as drawing a giant face of a dairy cow on the windows of the government office building and displaying quiz questions on the dairy industry and milk.
The officials also set on a project named “Pack to the Mountain” themselves, counting the number of milk cartons — referred to as “milk packs” in Japan — equivalent to the amount of milk they drink during the month. The goal is to consume enough milk so that the milk cartons — assuming that the cartons are stacked on top of each other — reach the height of the 2,486-meter-high Mount Nantai, a sacred mountain in Tochigi.
“We hope people will drink more Tochigi-made milk than they usually do to support dairy farmers,” said Kazuhiro Akutsu, 52, an official of the division.
Officials of the Tochigi Prefectural Government’s livestock production promotion division wear Holstein pattern shirts at their office in Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture, every Friday in August.