1/2Pet animals “Four legs better?” The Economist June 22nd 2019 ペット
It is not clear that the global boom in pet-keeping is doing humans much good
Martin Salomon has brought his dog, Manolo, to the “canine area” of a public park in Condesa, a wealthy district of Mexico City. As he watches the happy, free-running animals, he reflects on how dogs’ lives have changed. Mr Salomon, who was born in the northern state of Sonora, recalls that his grandmother had two dogs － a black one called Negro and a white one called Guero, meaning pale. They were seldom allowed in the house. And today? Recently he attended a birthday party for a friend’s dog, with a cake, candles and a party hat for the pooch.
In South Korea, some people who keep cats refer to themselves not as “owners” or even “parents” － a more condescending term that appeared in America in the 1990s and has spread. Instead they are “butlers”. Some of their feline masters to a cat hotel in the Gangnam district of Seoul. It resembles a beauty studio, with plump cushions and pastel colours. The rooms and suites, costing $35-50 for a day, are equipped with ridges and tunnels for the cats to play in, as well as cameras and microphones. “It’s so the cats can hear their butlers’ voices,” explains the owner, Cho Hanna.
Keeping pets is hardly novel; nor is pampering them. Archaeologists have discovered graves from more than 10,000 years ago containing the skeletons of humans and dogs. Some of the dogs suffered from diseases, and were presumably cared for by their owners. Eighteen-century portraits are full of well-groomed animals. But never have so many people kept pets, nor have they fawn over them as much as they do now. For better or worse, an almost global pet culture is emerging.
Heavy petting
Some parts of the world are keener than others on pets. Argentines are much more likely to keep animals than are Japanese people; in mostly Muslim countries people tend not to have dogs. But in general, the wealthier a country is, the more people have pets. As a rule of thumb, says Carlos Romano, the head of Nestle’s pet-food operation in Latin America, the animal instinct kicks in when household incomes exceed about $5,000 a year.
As people grow better-off, their attitudes to domestic animals change. Surveys by Euromonitor. a market-research firm, show that in emerging markets wealthy people are more likely than poorer people to describe pets as “beloved members of the family”, as opposed to merely well-treated animals. In 2015 a Harris poll of American pet owners found that 95% deemed their animals part of the family － up from 88% in 2007. Americans behave accordingly. More
In countries with long traditions of pet-keeping, these changes may be visible only with hindsight. Sami Tanner, the head of strategy at Musti Group, which owns almost 300 pet-supplies shops in Finland, Norway and Sweden, points to the Irish setters that his family has kept. In the late 1960s his mother’s dog, Cimi, was fed cheap dog food and table scraps, and had just two accoutrements: a blanket and a leash. In 2009 Mr Tanner’s dog Break became the first canine in the family to have his teeth brushed, and the first to acquire a raincoat and a bed. His current dog, Red, has several jackets, attends dog school, and is a model.
Elsewhere, the changes are head-snappingly fast. In parts of East Asia, dogs have long been valued as food. Cats may be made into tonics. Western journalists in South Korea for the 2018 Winter Olympics went in search of dog meat; they found it, even though officials offered to pay restaurants to remove it while the visitors were around. As the culture of pet-keeping spreads, though, a domestic lobby has emerged. In 2017 the Korean president, Moon Jae-in, acquired a dog from a shelter; earlier this year the mayor of Seoul vowed to close all dog butchers. Chinese animal-lovers hound the dog-meat festival held each year in the province of Guangxi.
Some animals are easier to see as family members than others. As the expectation that pets should provide companionship and emotional support has grown, the range of favoured species has narrowed. In 1949 Konard Lorenz, an Austrian biologist, recommended fish, hamsters, bullfinches and starlings as excellent pets. Five years later, Marlon Brando’s character in “On the Waterfront” kept pigeons. Today just two species dominate: Canis familiaris and Felis catus. Sales of dog and cat food are rising in Britain. Rabbit, rodent, fish and bird food are all in decline, according to the Pet Food Manufacturers’ Association.
Of the two privileged species, cats have a slight advantage. Euromonitor expects the number of pet cats worldwide to grow 22% between 2018 and 2024, compared with 18% for dogs. Cats are better suited to apartment living than dogs, so they are more at home in the densely populated, fast-growing cities of Asia. They are also more tolerant of their owners’ － sorry, butlers’ － erratic working hours.
