More than half of eligible male workers took paternity leave during the latest period, topping the one-half mark for the first time and exceeding the government target of 50 percent in fiscal 2025.

The results of the Basic Survey of Gender Equality in Employment Management for fiscal 2025, which the labor ministry released on July 31, show the figure at 50.9 percent, up 10.4 percentage points year on year.

Businesses are required, starting in spring 2022, to ask their male workers who have had a child whether they wish to take paternity leave.

Labor ministry officials said that more male workers are taking child care leave partly because more businesses and other workplaces are becoming supportive of paternity leave.

In addition, the increase also comes as younger workers are telling their workplace officials more actively about their desire to take child care leave.

The survey was taken of 6,300 workplaces, with effective responses obtained from 3,291.

The survey studied what portion of male workers whose spouse gave birth during a one-year period from Oct. 1, 2023, entered into paternity leave no later than Oct. 1, 2025.

Of the male workers who returned to work from child care leave in fiscal 2024, the most, at 30.3 percent, took the leave for durations of at least one month and less than three months.

The corresponding ratio was 28.0 percent in the fiscal 2023 survey of two years earlier, even though the figures cannot be compared directly because the survey methods were different.

The latest survey of fiscal 2025 found, in the meantime, that the ratio of eligible female workers who took maternity leave was 88.3 percent, up 1.7 percentage points year on year.

Of the female workers who returned to work from maternity leave in fiscal 2024, the most, at 31.4 percent, took the leave for durations of at least 12 months and less than 18 months.