About

What this site does

Japan has around 380 regional beef brands, each defined by a brand association, a prefecture or an agricultural cooperative. Each one sets conditions for using its name, published on official websites or in the Geographical Indication (GI) register of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.

Those conditions are scattered across Japanese-language documents. Most English guides stop after a dozen famous names.

Niku Meikan reads the primary sources and lays out every brand's definition in the same format: breed, where it must be raised, age, grading and other conditions — each with a citation.

When a source says nothing, we say so

Many brands do not publish an age or grading requirement. We never fill the gap with a guess; the page says "Not set (no such requirement in the source)".

GI rules and brand standards are kept apart

For GI-registered brands we show the production method in the registered specification. Stricter standards that an association sets on its own are a different thing, and we do not mix them in.

No logos or certification seals

Brand names are often registered regional trademarks, logos are protected designs, and the GI mark may only be used by registered producers. This site uses text and links to the official sites only.

About advertising

Some brand pages and guides in the English and Traditional Chinese editions carry affiliate links to the activity booking sites GetYourGuide and Klook. The Japanese edition has no ads at present. We have also applied to use Google AdSense.

• Ads are labelled "Ad", and the links carry rel="sponsored".
• Whether a page has an ad never changes which brands we list or how we describe their requirements.
• Details are under "Advertising and affiliate links" in the privacy policy.

How we use AI

This site is built with the help of generative AI. Here is where we use it and where we do not.

• Where we use it: drafting and editing text, helping to read source documents, and writing code.
• Where we do not: breed, region, age, grade and other requirements are never taken from an AI answer. Every one is checked against a primary source and cited.
• The opening sentence, title and description of each brand page are not written by AI. A program assembles them from the requirements table using a fixed pattern.
• The header images on the guides are AI-generated and labelled as such. They do not depict real meat, cattle or chickens.

Found a mistake?

Please tell us. A correction is a sign the site is working.

Who runs this site

IDEA Technology (ideatech.biz) — info@nikumeikan.jp

We are not livestock specialists. That is exactly why we do not copy from other guides: every requirement is checked against a primary source and cited, and the data is published as JSON so anyone can verify it.