There were an estimated 1.48 million pet dogs and 1.31 million pet cats in Taiwan last year, an increase of 19 percent and 50 percent respectively compared with 2021, the Ministry of Agriculture’s latest survey showed.
As raising children is challenging, many people have turned to raising pets, which is why the ministry data released on Friday show an increase of pet dogs and cats in the nation.
The ministry’s data, based on a telephone survey last year, show that 28.3 percent of households in Taiwan have pets, which is a 6.7 percent increase from 2021.
Photo: Tainan City Animal Health Inspection and Protection Office
The survey estimated that there were 1,480,637 pet dogs last year, an increase of 19 percent from 1,235,218 dogs in 2021.
There were an estimated 1,311,449 pet cats last year, an increase of 50 percent from 870,801 in 2021, the data showed.
The survey result matches the global trend of the number of households with pet cats increasing, as urbanization intensifies, the ministry said.
About 10.4 percent of households had cats last year, an increase of 3.8 percent compared with 2021, while 13.8 percent had dogs last year, an increase of 1.3 percent, it said.
Moreover, the ministry found that 9.3 percent of households have other pets, which is a 3.3 percent increase from two years ago.
Pets in Taiwan are becoming more diversified, so the ministry’s administration of pets needs adjustments, it said.
The survey also showed that the sterilization rate of pet dogs was 68.9 percent, an increase from 66.4 percent in 2021, and the rate among pet cats was 82.8 percent, increasing from 84.6 percent, suggesting that cat owners are relatively willing to have their pet neutered.
The pet dog registration rate was 70.6 percent last year, an increase from 69.5 percent in 2021, and 58.4 percent of cats were registered, up from 50.7 percent in 2021, the survey showed.
National regulations require pet dogs to be microchipped and registered, while only Taipei requires pet cats to be registered.
The ministry said it is mulling different levels of animal welfare management for different types of pets.
As the number of cat owners has significantly increased, it is also assessing the feasibility of a mandatory pet cat registration mechanism, it added.
Letting unsterilized pet dogs run outdoors freely is the main source of the stray dog problem, the ministry said, and urged dog owners not to let their dogs wander around and reproduce freely.
Aside from landline phone calls, the survey’s sampling population included randomly selected cellphone numbers, and 10,348 valid samples were collected, with a confidence level of 95 percent and a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points, the ministry said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday voiced dissatisfaction with the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans- Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), whose latest meeting, concluded earlier the same day, appeared not to address the country’s application. In a statement, MOFA said the CPTPP commission had "once again failed to fairly process Taiwan’s application," attributing the inaction to the bloc’s "succumbing to political pressure," without elaborating. Taiwan submitted its CPTPP application under the name "Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu" on Sept. 22, 2021 -- less than a week after China
THE GOOD WORD: More than 100 colleges on both sides of the Pacific will work together to bring students to Taiwan so they can learn Mandarin where it is spoken A total of 102 universities from Taiwan and the US are collaborating in a push to promote Taiwan as the first-choice place to learn Mandarin, with seven Mandarin learning centers stood up in the US to train and support teachers, the Foundation for International Cooperation in Higher Education of Taiwan (FICHET) said. At the annual convention of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages held over the weekend in New Orleans, Louisiana, a Taiwan Pavilion was jointly run by 17 representative teams from the FICHET, the Overseas Community Affairs Council, the Steering Committee for the Test of Proficiency-Huayu, the
A home-style restaurant opened by a Taiwanese woman in Quezon City in Metro Manila has been featured in the first-ever Michelin Guide honoring exceptional restaurants in the Philippines. The restaurant, Fong Wei Wu (豐味屋), was one of 74 eateries to receive a “Michelin Selected” honor in the guide, while one restaurant received two Michelin stars, eight received one star and 25 were awarded a “Bib Gourmand.” The guide, which was limited to restaurants in Metro Manila and Cebu, was published on Oct. 30. In an interview, Feng Wei Wu’s owner and chef, Linda, said that as a restaurateur in her 60s, receiving an
MORE RETALIATION: China would adopt a long-term pressure strategy to prevent other countries or future prime ministers following in Sanae Takaichi’s steps, an academic said Taiwan should maintain communications with Japan, as Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is to lead a revision of security documents, Taiwanese academics said yesterday. Tensions have risen between Japan and China over remarks by Takaichi earlier this month that the use of force against Taiwan would constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan. Prospect Foundation president Lai I-chung (賴怡忠) yesterday said Takaichi’s stance regarding Taiwan is the same as past Japanese prime ministers, but her position is clearer than that of her predecessors Fumio Kishida and Shigeru Ishiba. Although Japan views a “Taiwan contingency” as a “survival-threatening situation,” which would allow its military to
RSS