Satoru Kishimoto, an attorney and board member of the animal welfare nonprofit Animal Defense Team based in Itami, Hyogo Prefecture, explaining the lack of whistleblowing in the pet shop industry.
© Mainichi ShimbunVoices
in
Japan
quote of the day
Employees of pet shops fear retaliation, such as being fired or having their wages cut. As a result, there is often insufficient evidence to prove mistreatment.
©2025 GPlusMedia Inc.
6 Comments
Login to comment
Aly Rustom
send in undercover cops to work there.
Ricky Kaminski13
Adopt pets from rescue centers. There’s a bunch of them around. We have our beautiful two cats and didn’t pay the ridiculous ten or twenty man that some of these shady pet shops charge.
purple_depressed_bacon
Adopt, don't shop. Also, get rid of those horrendous animal cafes.
BeerDeliveryGuy
Many animal rescue NGOs operate dog and cat cafes, where customers and potential foster families can interact with the animals before adopting.
It may not be the ideal solution, but at least the dogs are not caged all day, and revenues are used to care for the animals.
gaijintraveller
Try ARK Animal Rescue Kansai, which started in Kansai after the Kobe earthquake and later expanded to Tokyo. Try Japan Cat Network. Try your local vet. They have webpages and Facebook pages. Most vets know people looking for adpters for kittens or puppies. From those groups you won't get a free pet, but you will pay a reasonable price which almost certainly doesn't even cover the organisations costs. You can also enquire at the city office to see if they know of a local rescue organisation.
I believe Kanagawa no longer kills unwanted pets and strays but tries to find new homes.
Pet shops should go out of business. They have been banned in several European countries. Behind them is a cruel breeding system. Perhaps I should say overbreeding and inbreeding system.
DanteKH
I always recomand people to go to the shelters. They can literally find hundreds of cats of dogs ready to be yours for free almost. Instead of paying half of million yen for a breeder cat, you can pay 5000 plus vaccination and medical insurance to a shelter baby aley cat, which is usually much more healthier and stronger, since it is not inbreed for money.