Beyond cute: The truth about our pets’ pawprint

The dawn of a superfluous era is emerging. Life in excess. A penchant for growth and gratification. An age in which scarcity no longer restricts humankind’s proclivity to indulge. Our very companions — pets — now bear their own environmental pawprint, silently echoing our collective consumption habits. Life, as we know it, is metamorphosing from instinctive survival patterns into an advanced state of superfluity.

How has humanity become so acquisitive and enthralled by impulsive desire?

From extravagant lifestyles to exponential appetites dominating public interest, Mother Nature’s delicate balancing act is being overrun by an unruly adolescent — an ignorant juvenile who rejects coexistential warnings and disrespects the earthly equilibrium.

Coexistence and the proliferation of superfluity

Walk through the duty-free section of any airport, from first to third world, and you’ll find abundance. A plethora of spirits, chocolates, cosmetics, and an endless supply of water — all packaged, bottled and lined up to quench, tantalise or soothe one’s noble appetite ahead of a well-deserved journey.

Primed for uncapped consumption, we seem to gratify ourselves at every moment’s convenience, confronted by a constant craving to indulge.

Unfortunately for our cohabitant species, this power-play is proving catastrophic. The homogenocene, in which biodiversity is being significantly disrupted, appears to be the culminating effect of vast consumption habits and growing globalism.

What evokes such blatant disregard and irrationality in Homo sapiens to behave in self-absorbed ways that contradict its mindful, co-habitant self?

This may be the evolutionary phenomenon hindering our constructive progression as a species to what Yuval Noah Harari terms, Homo Deus. More precisely, a phenomenon that is disconnecting humans from the terrestrial biorhythm — stunting planetary coexistence and accelerating the rate of species extinction.

A burgeoning pawprint

Since the rise of humans, wild mammal biomass has declined by 85% according to Our World In Data. Considering both wild and domesticated creatures, humans and their livestock now account for 96% of mammals on Earth, while wild animals represent just 4%. That’s an overall biomass (tonnes of carbon) amounting to 35% for humans and a staggering 63% for livestock.

Equally disturbing, when comparing animals in terms of biomass, global poultry weighs in at more than two times the amount of wild birds, while the Living Planet Index charted a steep decline in over 5,000 wildlife species to approx 27% in just 50 years.

Where did our evolving habits and herd mentality steer so wildly astray, overturning Mother Nature’s delicate balance in biodiversity?

In the space of just over 50 years, a self-sustaining symmetry has reached a critical inflection point that is existentially precarious. Pretty scary, right? Cohabitation on Earth, it seems, will become ever more perilous as long as humanity’s wildest desire remains uncapped.

Leading this imbalance, of course, is an insatiable human craving for beef, poultry, fish, and dairy, but we cannot ignore the carbon contribution that dogs and cats account for. Pet food, responsible for about a quarter of the environmental impact of meat production (i.e. land, water, fossil fuels, phosphates, and biocides), is a major contributor to emissions*.

Considering recent estimates of approximately 850 million cats and dogs worldwide*, the global pet food market — valued at USD 192 billion in 2024 — is expected to grow at +8.54% CAGR over the next five years. Not to mention an additional 64 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions pooped out per year thanks to the needy diet our hungry hounds and furry felines require.

At this rate, there are likely to be a whole lot more pets per household to feed by 2029, and who knows, with rising demand, pet parents could soon be showering their fur babies with additional ingredients.

Think: Muttspresso and Catuccino as competing brands for a newly satiable pet category. Playful pondering of course, but all it takes is a healthy hand of Pavlovian pseudoscience and a curious cohort of cosmo-companions to drive us further away from rationality.

In fact, since the last update of this piece, Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts have each subtly introduced absurd product lines — namely, ‘Puppuccino’ (a cup of whipped cream) and ‘Cup for Pup’ treats. Alas, I rest my paws on this preposterous fad.

Pets hold a sacred place in our lives — they bring value to people in ways each of us holds dear and devoted. But this does not change the fact that there is a fundamental issue reshaping and undermining coexistence on our fragile planet. With biodiversity at a critical point, humans need to find innovative and sensible ways to become more environmentally conscious pet parents.

A brief history of dogs, David Ian Howe

Wary wolves: A keystone species at odds with superfluity and the homogenocene

A recent encounter with a wild wolf while exploring the Swiss Alps inspired me to probe humankind’s impact on this stealthy creature’s habitat.

Having hiked up above the tree line to set up camp on a summer’s night in the Italian part of Switzerland, a magnificent starry night turned chilly as a south-easterly wind blew over our tents with ferocity, followed by what the local shepherd living in a nearby hut had warned us about: an inquisitive grey wolf scavenging the vicinity for remnants of our dinner’s delight.

Alp de Mem, home to a shy grey wolf
lurking in the San Vittore region

In Switzerland, there are estimated to be between 30-35 wolves, and with a difficult past of having endured a vicious campaign to eradicate this so-called ‘bloodthirsty killer’ throughout the 1900s, one wonders how wolves will fare over the next century alongside rising demand for domestication.

For each wolf on Earth, there are as many as 1,884 dogs living with human families (i.e. 250,000 wolves*; 471 million dogs*).

This imbalance is astonishing when one contrasts the crucial role wolves have on ecosystems compared to their canine counterpart. For example, this keystone species is widely known to regulate the world of predator and prey, constructively influencing browsing and foraging patterns while enhancing habitats.

As human activity — along with its domesticated workforce and pet companions — encroach on wild habitats, food sources become depleted, biodiverse forests are affected from foreign excrement, and diurnal species are forced into nocturnal behaviour to avoid human contact.

With hunting restrictions fortunately on the rise, the Central European wolf population seems to be thriving once again. But Switzerland’s human and pet population, like the rest of the world’s, has a burgeoning appetite that is placing significant pressure on natural resources.

Nature’s delicate intricacy: A tale of sea wolves and the harmonious biorhythm of Vancouver Island

Island of the Sea Wolves, Netflix

Illustrating nature’s delicate balance untouched by human intervention, a recent Netflix series explores Canada’s Island of the Sea Wolves, taking viewers on an exquisite journey through the seasonal struggle of a pack of sea wolves and the harmonious biorhythm of Vancouver Island’s intricate ecosystem.

A wiser, conscientious way forward for our pets’ pawprint

All is not lost. Global land allocation for agriculture may have already peaked and, with a growing sustainability impetus to curb the expansion of livestock farming, habitats may yet be revitalised — finally bringing deforestation to an end.

To protect our planet we need to preserve habitats and ecosystems for flora and fauna to flourish. No greater priority exists on Earth in order for planetary coexistence to prosper once again.

For this to happen, Homo sapiens must reduce the amount of space allocated to agricultural activities — whereby half of all habitable land is currently used for farming. Moreover, addressing consumption habits that are incompatible with the world’s life-preserving biorhythm is crucial to mitigating habitat loss.

To fast-track humanity’s journey to Homo Deus — or, rather, to an advanced sense of biocentric mindfulness — heightened awareness about the consequences of growth-driven consumerism needs to be acknowledged.

Holistic actionable intervention, it seems, holds the key to garnering a culture of collective sensibility upon which the constructive progression of all species depends.