Sunday, 22 February 2026

Dog Population Growing Faster than Human Population in NZ

Stuff

December 1, 2022

VIRGINIA WOOLF/STUFF

PHOTO: VIRGINIA WOOLF/STUFF

Dog numbers in New Zealand are soaring, outstripping human population growth by a factor of 10 in the past year.

The country’s dog population grew by 2.4% in 2022 (on top of a 3.1% lift in 2021), compared to human population growth of a mere 0.2% (this year) and 0.4% (2021), according to an analysis of registered dogs by Infometrics.

Kiwi families have welcomed nearly 70,000 extra dogs into their homes in the past few years, taking the total number of human’s best friends to 605,834.