The RSPCA has just published the report: The Welfare State: Measuring Animal Welfare in the UK 2006, a statistical analysis of animal welfare in the UK.

The annual report considers 35 animal welfare indicators relating to wildlife, farm animals, research animals and pets. Key findings concerning pets include:

• The majority of dogs and cats in the UK (84%) are still not microchipped.
• Since 2004, the number of dog fights reported to the RSPCA has increased 5 fold.
• In 2006, local authorities had to deal with 50,000 stray dogs.
• As few as one in five pet shops selling ‘exotic’ animals such as snakes and primates offer free written information to customers.

Other main findings include:

• The proportion of people who feel that for a society to be truly civilised, animal welfare must be a key priority has leapt from 54% to 73% in the last year.
• The number of wild-caught birds imported into the EU has plummeted from 72,000 in 2003 to 11 last year, following a recent ban. But the number of wild-caught reptiles imported has increased from 11,000 to 18,400.
• A huge increase in the number of meat chickens raised to higher-welfare standards, quadrupling from 10 million in 2004 to more than 40 million this year. However this is still less than 5% of the market.

There is more available on the website http://www.animalwelfarefootprint.com/, including a questionnaire to test your own 'animal footprint'.