Name: Puppy love: dog weddings on the rise in China
Uploaded: 2025-01-24T22:00:16.000Z
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He Huifeng

Just a few months after opening his first pet clinic in Hangzhou in early 2019, Yang Zhong, the founder of Joy Pet Hospital, launched two more branches.
Despite the lingering impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and a property market downturn on many industries, China’s pet economy is thriving, fuelling Yang’s ambitions for rapid expansion.
By 2021, he had opened his first teaching hospital and five new pet hospitals in two other cities – Shanghai and Ningbo.
He now runs over 30 hospitals – with a total of about 400 staff members – that have treated over 100,000 pet dogs and cats.
Yang is riding the boom of the growing pet economy in China, where dogs and cats have become increasingly popular companions for the country’s growing ranks of elderly people and single young adults amid falling marriage and birth rates.


Based on the latest quarterly data, around 6 million marriages are expected to be registered in China this year – the lowest number since 1980.
Meanwhile, the country’s fertility rate – the average number of children born to each woman – is among the lowest in the world and is now estimated to be below one.
A rate of 2.1 children per woman is widely accepted as the rate needed for a country’s population to remain constant.
Pets probably now outnumber infants and toddlers in China, according to a recent Goldman Sachs report. It is estimated that there were over 120 million pet dogs and cats in China in 2023, with the number of pet cats up 1.1 per cent year on year, and the number of pet dogs up 6.8 per cent.
The pet economy, along with the rise of other emerging subsectors such as “blind box” retailing, reflects a change in consumption patterns among those buffeted by the economic slowdown and demographic changes that is driven by a desire for emotional comfort.
It has emerged as one of the few bright spots in the overall economy and offers better career prospects.
A report released by the Beike Research Institute, a think tank affiliated with Beike Zhaofang, China’s biggest online property agency, said the number of people living alone in China is expected to reach 150 million to 200 million by 2030, with the number of single adults aged from 20 to 39 increasing from 18 million in 2010 to 40 million to 70 million.
Meanwhile, a survey by Zhenai.com, a Chinese online dating platform, found that 70 per cent of single people born in the 1990s have pets.
The 2023-24 China Pet Industry Operation Status and Consumer Market Monitoring Report by iiMedia Research said that while the pet economy’s growth rate has halved from its peak of over 33.5 per cent in 2020, it is still expected to be worth 811.4 billion yuan (US$111.5 billion) this year, up from 592.8 billion yuan in 2023.
While many Chinese university graduates are struggling to find jobs, popular social media platforms are filled with posts offering optimistic insights about careers in the pet economy.
“The rise of the pet economy is driving the demand for talent, especially in the field of pet healthcare,” Yang said.
“There are tens of thousands of pet clinics and hospitals in China, but the shortage of practitioners is still huge. Young people willing to join the industry, whether they are interns, assistants or veterinarians, could easily find a job.”




After shooting up to 18.8 per cent in August, China’s urban unemployment rate for those aged 16 to 24 – excluding students – eased from 17.1 per cent in October to 16.1 per cent in November.
Yang said interns at his hospitals initially earn about 2,500 yuan a month, while a fresh graduate can earn 6,000 yuan a month, with free food and accommodation. Senior veterinarians with about five years’ experience can earn 20,000 to 30,000 yuan a month or more.
According to Euromonitor data cited in a report by China International Capital Corporation (CICC) analysts, there were over 27,000 pet hospitals and clinics in China in 2023 compared to 32,690 in the United States and 12,706 in Japan. On average, each pet hospital in China serves 6,862 pets, 1.25 times the number in the US and 5.5 times that in Japan.
But the average annual medical expenditure for pets over six years old in China would have to reach 3,400 yuan, 10 times the current level, to match that in the US, according to American Animal Hospital Association figures.
Nevertheless, the increased medical needs of elderly pets are expected to drive rapid growth in China’s pet hospital market and boost the sector’s profitability, compared to other sectors affected by weak domestic demand.
Over 80 per cent of Chinese pet hospitals reported annual revenues below 2.4 million yuan in 2023 but nearly 75 per cent reported a profit, the CICC report said.
The average investment per hospital was around 1.57 million yuan, and their average size was just over 290 square metres (3,140 square feet).
As Chinese society places more importance on pets, the demand and profit potential of the pet medical market will continue to grow
Dong Xin, FLC Veterinary Hospital
Yang said a newly opened pet hospital could expect to start making a profit after three to six months of operation.
Dong Xin, co-founder of Hangzhou’s FLC Veterinary Hospital, said more people have invested in pet clinics in the past three years, and two to three pet hospitals can now be found in most residential neighbourhoods in big cities.
“Many young clinical veterinarians have plans to start their own business to expand to lower-tier cities, while those with over 10 years of experience in the field remain extremely rare,” she said.
“As Chinese society places more importance on pets, the demand and profit potential of the pet medical market will continue to grow, and young practitioners can find better opportunities for development in this industry.”
Yang plans to raise 20 million yuan in financing for 70 new pet clinics in the developed Yangtze Delta region over the next three years.
Dong hopes to build a leading, comprehensive pet hospital focusing on ophthalmology and neurosurgery, with other specialist areas such as cardiology, internal medicine and dentistry to be added later.
The shortage of veterinary professionals may be the major bottleneck limiting the sector’s development.
There were only 165,000 practising veterinarians in China in 2023, leaving a shortage of 300,000, according to the CICC report. It said that each veterinarian in China serves an average of 3,577 pets, 1.5 times the number in the US and 3.7 times that in Japan.

To address the talent shortage and gain a leading position in the pet industry, Shenzhen, the city with the youngest population in China – average age just 32.5 years – introduced supportive policies in August 2023.
They included establishing university internship bases and providing subsidies for students ranging from 1,500 yuan a month for undergraduates and 2,500 yuan a month for master’s students to 4,500 yuan a month for doctoral students to lure more young people to the city’s pet healthcare sector.
Shenzhen is estimated to have been home to 500,000 pet dogs and cats last year, according to the city’s Daily Sunshine newspaper, with more than 88,000 pet-related enterprises reaping total annual revenues surpassing 10 billion yuan.
In the first 10 months of 2023 there were 1,525 new pet-related businesses registered in Shenzhen, a 15 per cent year on year increase, the report said.
Li Yun, a teacher in her 30s in Shenzhen, once spent 30,000 yuan on her credit card in one month to treat two cats – one a domestic cat, the other an American shorthair – and still ended up losing one.
“In Shenzhen, the daily expenses for keeping a pet cat or dog are about 1,000 yuan a month. But if the pet gets sick, the treatment costs can skyrocket,” she said.
“I have a friend with an exotic shorthair, and every two months it has to be admitted to hospital. Each time, the treatment costs several thousand yuan, mainly for eye inflammation and some congenital diseases. My friend is just an ordinary office worker, but she’s invested so much effort into caring for her pet.
“My friends and I all care deeply about our pets’ health. I think for younger pet owners, this has become the new norm. We want our pets to be healthy and happy, and our feelings are no different from those of parents who have their own children.
“Good veterinarians are needed and welcomed everywhere.”


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Pet economy offers better career prospects as clinics and hospitals open across country


Pet economy offers better career prospects as clinics and hospitals open across country.
