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Half of the pet dogs in Berlin are being kept illegally owing to a suspected “boycott” of unpopular registration rules rolled out after a surge in ownership during the pandemic, figures have shown.
Dogs have long been taxed in the German capital, primarily for sanitation costs.
However, a policy introduced in 2022 requiring every owner to also register their pooch with data from an implanted microchip – mandatory from the age of three months – prompted a backlash over the additional expense and nuisance.
Official figures cited by local media on Tuesday showed that Berlin’s 17 district tax offices had records for 131,258 dogs by the end of last year, accounting for revenue of €12.7m (£10.8m), the daily BZ reported.
However, more than three years after the requirement was introduced, Berlin has just 66,221 canines recorded on the official Hunderegister (dog registry) – about half the number subject to a tax.
A Berlin city government spokesperson could not immediately confirm the figures, but cited media reports that attributed the meagre registration rate to ignorance of the policy, data protection concerns and “a certain reticence about the additional costs”.
The register was designed to help identify runaway dogs, ensure animal welfare and trace canines responsible for aggressive behaviour.
When it began, dog owners complained about the additional expense of reporting the double-digit serial number on the microchips implanted in their pets, which costs €17.50 for each dog when done online and €26.50 over the telephone. The fees are collected by a private company tasked by Berlin with running the Hunderegister.
“The current figures show very clearly: there is still a big gap between the number in the tally of taxed dogs and the number of animals actually centrally registered,” Alexander J Herrmann, a legal affairs expert for Germany’s co-ruling Christian Democratic Union, told BZ.
Herrmann said that although the Hunderegister had a marked increase in entries over the last year, it was a “deplorable state of affairs that more than 65,000 dogs are still not registered”.
Failure to comply with the policy can lead to fines of up to €10,000, with dogs subject to “spot” checks of their microchips by public order officers dispatched to roads and parks.
Herrmann suspects the number of outlaw dogs living in Berlin below the radar of the tax authorities and registry staff is even larger, “impacting effective monitoring and security in the public space”.
Last year 523 Berliners were attacked by dogs, and in 97 instances people were jumped on in a threatening manner. In 357 cases, dogs bit other canines.
Under a law passed in 2016, breeds deemed especially dangerous such as pit bulls and American staffordshire terriers require separate registration.
