Nanook - Do you mean Japanese pet owners are less educated then in Europe ?
...less educated in the field of how to buy their pet, how to keep and train their pet, what their pet's needs are, etc. The number of pets in Japan has increased dramatically over the past few years. To meet this demand, the number of "breeders" did so too. A large number of puppy mills were started by people, who are in that business just for the quick buck and have no interest in keeping their animals free of genetic diseases or even clean. The puppies will be taken away from their mothers at the age of around 6 or 7 weeks, in order to arrive at the pet shops at the "right" age of about 8 weeks. If the puppy (or kitten) is not sold from the pet shop by the age of about 13 or 14 weeks, it's value will drop to almost 0 and it will, therefore, be put asleep :-(
The owners usually buy their pets in pet shops (they usually don't know of breeders and rescue organizations) just by their looks, their color, whatever, sometimes just as a fashionable accessory, without knowing, what the needs of the breed will be over the life span of the animal. So it is not uncommon, that you might find a Siberian Husky, who has to stay in a cage inside an appartment in the summer heat or being chained up, having to do his business on a wee pad, while his owner is working long hours. Not having had the time to socialise with other animals, when it was a puppy, being mainly alone during the working hours of the owner and then having to be quiet, please, while the owner wants to sleep at night, gives the dog a very limited time to be itself. "Gimme five" is often the only thing, if any, that these dogs have ever learned. Some are not even house trained. Some of these dogs develop behaviour disorders. Some of the stories don't have a happy end.
Side story: I was at the vets. A dog was there, who recovered from a heart attack. The vet asked the owners, what kind of food they would give him and they said. "No way would we feed him cheap dog food, he does, of course, eat the same food as we do". In the "soy sauce driven" Japanese cuisine, that is way too much salt for a dogs little heart. So love is often there, but not the matching know-how.
But times seem to be changing a bit now, going into the right direction. "How to keep an animal" shows on TV are becoming more frequent, here and there some dog training centers, however crude, pop up and from my personal experience, I would say, that I see much fewer chain dogs than 20 years ago. In the area, where I live, some dog-runs have been installed and the more responsible dog owners would meet there, have their dogs play and socialise.
So to summarize, in terms of pet keeping, Japan is, to my opinion, about 50 years behind western Europe, slowly catching up. There is sure room for a young, enthusiastic vet (who masters the Japanese language) to come over and build something extraordinary.
Good luck
