Good practice

Réforme japonaise de la loi sur le congé parental 2022 — Congé postnatal pour les pères (産後パパ育休)

La révision 2022 de la loi japonaise sur le congé parental a créé un congé postnatal dédié aux pères, jusqu'à 28 jours dans les 8 premières semaines. Le taux de recours des pères est passé de 17,1 % (EF2022) à 40,5 % (EF2024) ; l'objectif gouvernemental est de 85 % d'ici 2030.

17.1% → 40.5%

Recours des pères au congé de paternité (FY2022–FY2024)

85%

Objectif gouvernemental (by 2030)

Details

Maturity: Scaling
Promoter: Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), Japan
Period: 2022-present
Keywords: parental leave, fathers, work-life balance, gender equality, childcare

Context

La modification de 2022 de la loi japonaise sur le congé parental a créé un congé de paternité postnatal pouvant aller jusqu'à 28 jours au cours des huit premières semaines suivant la naissance.

Results

Le recours des pères au congé est passé de 17,1 % (exercice 2022) à 40,5 % (exercice 2024), le gouvernement visant 85 % d'ici 2030.

Implementation

Implementation detail (cost, timeline, staffing, conditions for success) is not yet available for this practice.

Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

C-NAPSE web research — accessed 2026-06-21
Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), Japan — accessed 2026-06-21
Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare: Work-Family Balance Policy — accessed 2026-06-21
World Economic Forum: Could Japan's paternity leave policy narrow the gender gap? (2023) — accessed 2026-06-21
Japan Times: Paternity leave uptake hits record 30% (August 2024) — accessed 2026-06-21

Quality score: 96/100

How is this calculated?

Evidence: Observational / pre–post

Top 4% in this catalogue (719 scored practices)

Scores cluster high, so position within the catalogue is often more telling than the number alone.

Evaluation

Evaluated by C-NAPSE

Score profile — the dimensions behind the score — how it's computed

Transferability / replicability2/3

The OECD and UNICEF have cited Japan's postnatal paternity leave as a top-ranked model; South Korea adopted a similar disclosure requirement, demonstrating demonstrated regional influence.

Impact on gender equality1/1

Fathers' uptake more than doubled from 17.1% (FY2022) to 40.5% (FY2024) in a country previously ranked 116th on the WEF Gender Gap Index, directly redistributing childcare burdens.

Effectiveness1/1

The law's explicit target of 30% uptake by FY2025 was surpassed at FY2023 (30.1%), and the FY2024 rate of 40.5% confirms the reform is on track toward the 85%-by-2030 goal.

Efficiency1/1

The reform leverages existing employment-insurance financing and employer reporting infrastructure; incremental legislative mandates rather than costly new programmes drove the uptake jump.

Evaluated outcomes1/1

MHLW publishes annual Basic Survey on Employment Management with verified uptake statistics; WEF, Nippon.com, and the Japan Institute for Labour Policy and Training (JIL) independently corroborate the trend.

Sustainability1/1

Embedded in permanent primary legislation with escalating employer disclosure obligations (expanded to 300+ employee companies in 2025) and a 2025 amendment confirming structural institutionalisation.

Achievement / evidence1/1

Fathers' leave uptake rose from 13.97% to 40.5% in three fiscal years, a concrete government-documented achievement tracked by official annual surveys.

Gender-mainstreaming embedding1/1

The reform explicitly addresses unequal distribution of care work as a structural driver of Japan's gender pay gap and women's low labour participation; mandatory fathers' leave targets male behaviour, not just women's.

Curator validation1/1

Data from official MHLW surveys, Japan Times reporting, WEF analysis, Mercer legal briefings, and peer-reviewed JIL publications — authoritative and independently corroborated.

Cite this

Evidoria. Réforme japonaise de la loi sur le congé parental 2022 — Congé postnatal pour les pères (産後パパ育休). Persistent ID: 1f5e276c-5379-4346-91b4-896534c99c77.

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