A pet animal boom has lasted with the expansion of related business to the market scale exceeding 1 trillion now. The dynamic statistics of population as of April 2010 by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication show the number of children under age fourteen at 17 million, while that of pet animals such as dogs and cats 21.473 million.
A survey in 2010 by Japan Pet-food Association; pet animals exceed children in number in Japan. To cope with a trend that more and more pet keepers consider their pets as family members, it has gone mainstream in the business to call their pets “companion animals.” The pet food industry has benefited most in the boom.
Its market has enlarged by increased number of pets and reached the scale of about 300 billion, while the medical treatments such as routine medical checkups have increased in frequency at veterinary hospitals and the number of veterinarians increased from 29,301 in 1998 to 35,028 in 2008 in the ten years’ time.
But a black cloud has formed in the year-on-year growing pet business. Number of pets so far smoothly increased has shown a declining trend at peak in 2008. Japan Pet-food Association says the number of pets in 2009 compared with the previous year decreased 5.8 percent in dogs, 8 percent in cats and predicts further decrease in 2010. Besides the decrease of pets is expected to accelerate as population decreases as well.
The related industries were shocked by the first time ever decrease since the statistics started. Also, a more serious matter for the industry than this is the fact that the popular dog types have changed from bigger to small-sized dogs. According to the registered number per dog type in 2010, the popularity number one dogs: poodle weigh three to five kgs, while #2 dogs; Chihuahua weigh one to three kgs lighter than cats. Dogs: golden retriever at upper ranks ten years ago that weigh twenty-seven to thirty-six kgs now sits on thirteenth. Other bigger dogs are also amid a general decline at the ranking.
