People visit the pet clothing stall during the 25th Pet Fair Asia in east China's Shanghai, Aug. 16, 2023. (Photo by Li Xinyi/Xinhua)
BEIJING, May 23 (Xinhua) -- China's pet economy has been on the rise in recent years. According to a report on pet industry recently released by a Chinese e-commerce platform, by 2025, the scale of China's pet economy is expected to exceed 800 billion yuan, which will attract more investments, reported China Securities Journal on Monday.
With the gradual increase in the number of pet families in China, the pet market shows a diversified, customized and socialized trend. Travel agencies, airlines and other segments of pet industry usher in unprecedented opportunities of development.
-- Business opportunities brought by pet travel
Based in east China's Shanghai, ichongyou, a company providing comprehensive services for customers and their pets, has conducted the business of traveling with pets by air since 2021.
Traveling with pets by plane is a distinctive service provided by the company, said Xia Xuying, co-founder of ichongyou, adding that by cooperating with Juneyao Airlines, the company has arranged about 30 chartered flights allowing customers to bring pets into the cabins.
"The business is quite popular. We generally release the travel schedules two months in advance, and the flight tickets are often sold out one month before the journeys. Sometimes there was too much overbooking that we had to charter one more flight," Xia added.
According to Xia, ichongyou will organize the first trip of traveling abroad with pets in June, taking the customers and their pets to Thailand. If everything goes well, ichongyou will try more travel destinations like Bali and Finland, Xia said.
Xia also estimated that the company's sales in 2024 will grow by around 30 percent.
-- Promising outlook in pet industry
In addition to pet travel, other pet-related consumption needs such as food, necessities, beauty, physical examination, medical care and photography have also significantly increased, bringing more business opportunities.
Zhao Jiao, who owns two dogs and one cat, said that she always tries her best to buy quality food for her pets. Meanwhile, Zhang also purchases pet medical insurance, spending about 300 yuan per pet each year.
According to a white paper on China's pet consumption in 2023 released by iDigital, the young generations spend 5,200 yuan on pets annually. Among them, as the essential items for raising pets, staple food and snacks account for 91.6 percent of food expenses. Besides, desinsectization and vaccination are also included in the consumption list of most pet owners.
-- More investments
Another white paper on China's pet industry released by a third-party organization shows that China is the second largest pet market in the world. In 2023, Chinese families owned 51.75 million pet dogs and 69.8 million pet cats, up 1.1 percent and 6.8 percent year on year respectively.
In recent years, the pet industrial chain has witnessed proliferating number of relevant enterprises and strong momentum of listed companies. Investors are accelerating the capital layout of pet economy.
According to the statistics of Tianyancha, a commercial inquiry platform, China's pet-related enterprises experienced dramatic growth over the past decade. So far, there are 4.107 million enterprises related to pet economy. From January to April this year, more than 543,000 entities were newly registered.
Many A-share listed companies engaged in pet business achieved domestic revenue growth in 2023. For instance, Shandong Luscious Pet Food Co., Ltd., Gambol Pet Group Co., Ltd., and Hangzhou Tianyuan Pet Products Co., Ltd. gained 0.282 billion yuan, 2.863 billion yuan and 0.912 billion yuan in domestic revenue in 2023 respectively, up 51.27 percent, 39.38 percent and 30.37 percent year on year.
(Edited by Gao Jingyan with Xinhua Silk Road, gaojingyan@xinhua.org)
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