Aged pet care a growth industry in greying Japan
As the Japanese population continues to age, so do their pets. Improvements in animal rearing and care have seen pets living longer, prompting new businesses to develop not only for ageing pet owners, but also for their increasingly elderly animals.
Seikatsu Kagaku Un-Ei, a Tokyo-based company that operates nursing homes and condominiums for the elderly, allows residents at 18 of its 27 facilities to live with their pets. Currently 25 households in the company’s condominiums keep dogs or cats as pets.
Kayoko Kitao, a 76-year-old resident who lives with her cat Ku in a condominium managed by the company in Saitama district’s Fujimino, said, “I decided right away (on this property) once I heard that I can live here with my pet. My conversations with other residents and the staff members here are more lively thanks to little Ku.”
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The company recommends facilities to elderly clients depending on their lifestyles and specific requests regarding living environments. The basic rules for keeping pets in the properties are that residents must take care of their own animals, and that prior consent must be obtained from next-door neighbours as well as those living in floors directly above and below the apartment.
Meanwhile, new products for ageing pets are also gaining popularity.
Major health care and household products maker Unicharm Corporation, for example, began marketing cat food in 2015 for felines around 20 years old, or equivalent to about 90 in humans.
Taking into consideration health and other feeding issues for old cats, the product contains a reduced amount of phosphorus to minimise the burden on the kidney and is available in the form of finer pellets or flakes for easier consumption.
Requests from customers with old cats inspired us to develop this product
The average life span for cats in Japan has increased from 14.4 years in 2011 to 15.8 years in 2015, and the number of cats over 20 years old is on the rise, according to Unicharm and the Japan Pet Food Association.
“Requests from customers with old cats inspired us to develop this product,” said Junichi Okamoto of Unicharm’s pet food business. “Ageing (of the pet population) is expected to continue further and we hope to roll out more products in the future.”
Newcomers from other industries are also joining in the competition. School uniform maker Tombow Company in Okayama district ventured into the pet goods market in 2014, amid dim prospects for growth in its student clothing products given Japan’s declining birth rate. By applying its expertise and techniques garnered from making school uniforms, Tombow currently manufactures and sells a special walking support harness for elderly dogs.
The harness assists dogs with injured hips or weakened legs to stand and walk. The company provides some 40 variations of the product in colour and design, fitting different breeds and sizes.
Customers can purchase it online, at large pet shops, as well as through catalogues available at about 1,000 veterinary clinics across the country.
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The dark side of the pet boom in Japan, however, is the problem of animals being abandoned by their owners.
In search of a new solution to help minimise the killing of unwanted cats at animal shelters and other places, Tokyo-based charity Tokyo Cat Guardian launched in 2014 a new concept of shared housing – living spaces that come with cats awaiting adoption.
“Share houses” are an increasingly popular type of dwelling in Japan where people with no connections to each other live together in the same property, often to enjoy lower rent and the company of housemates.
At each of Tokyo Cat Guardian’s three share houses in Tokyo, residents act as volunteers taking care of several cats there until new homes are found for the felines, such as taking turns with feeding and cleaning litter boxes.
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The charity said it plans to recruit residents for three other similar share houses in Tokyo, as well as to expand the concept into a franchise network of 10 locations within the year in the capital and elsewhere. Amid the recent rise of cat lovers in Japan, the group has also received an increasing amount of interest from real estate and property agencies, it said.
Keeping a pet involves responsibility. In some cases, owners have no choice but to give up their animal companion due to the owner’s old age or changes in living situations.
“We will work hard to promote this approach, in which we work together with the real estate industry such as through share houses, as a new way to help reduce the number of cats being culled,” said Yoko Yamamoto, the group’s representative.
