Chip and neuro rush to the rescue: AI recognizes dogs in Leningrad region
As of the end of 2024, 26 Russian regions already have animal registration in place, and as of January 1, this number will probably exceed three dozen. Most often the procedure is standard - the dog is implanted with a chip, by which it can be easily found or identified if necessary. However, some regions are looking for other methods of work. For example, in the Leningrad region, as an alternative, they have authorized the identification of dogs by photograph. Artificial intelligence will analyze the photos if necessary. Why compulsory registration of dogs is necessary for each region and whether artificial intelligence can help - in the material "Izvestia".
How AI will identify animals
On the fact that the Leningrad region from January 1, 2025 will introduce mandatory registration of animals, and for their identification will use artificial intelligence, representatives of the region reported at the III Russian Conference on Animal Rights, which was held by the public organization "Voices for Animals".
Natalia Shchagina, head of the department of state supervision in the field of animal treatment of the Leningrad Region Veterinary Department, said that this is the main feature of the system: animals do not have to be chipped, a photo will be enough.
"Artificial intelligence used to analyze the pictures provides more than 90% accuracy in identifying animals. This innovation will also help to prosecute those who commit violations, for example, allowing dogs to be out on their own. Just like drivers - the system records violations and sends them "letters of happiness", - said Natalia Shchagina, speaking at the conference.
Leonid Krotov, Head of the Veterinary Department of the Leningrad Region, told Izvestia that artificial intelligence will be able to recognize biometric characteristics of dogs: first of all, it is the image of the muzzle or nose.
- TheBiometric Solutions Center has been created and is successfully functioning in Goznak JSC to solve such problems," he explained. - In the developments of the Center of biometric solutions for the identification of pets and stray animals Goznak.Pet uses convolutional neural networks (CNN) - a class of machine learning algorithms that are used for image and video processing.
According to the veterinary chief, specially created datasets containing hundreds of thousands of animal images were used to train the neural networks. The system will continue to train as new pet dog photos are added to the database.
Will AI help with animal identification
In most regions where mandatory animal registration has already been introduced, this is done through a chipping procedure. More often than not, this is an albeit inexpensive but mandatory service.
-The wholesale cost of a microchip is about 100 rubles, and the rest is the markup of veterinary clinics for the service of installing the chip and entering information about the owner in various databases," Yuri Koretskikh, founder and executive director of the Alliance of Animal Defenders, explained to Izvestia. - Therefore, I believe that at least at the first stage of the introduction of universal mandatory registration of pets, state clinics should provide registration and chipping services at minimal prices, and for low-income segments of the population, a program can be adopted to provide these types of services for free.
At the same time, he believes that artificial intelligence is not yet able to fully replace other methods of animal identification - only as an additional tool.
In turn, Natalia Tsvetkova, coordinator of charitable programs of the Ray Charitable Foundation, believes that the idea of using AI seems "very modern and interesting and absolutely deserves the right to experiment". It is still unclear how well AI will cope with this task, but there is potential for neural networks to replace chipping.
Other experts don't yet believe in AI's ability to identify animals. Irina Robas, head of programs at the Nika charity fund for stray animals, considers chipping to be a mandatory condition for registering an animal, which should be free of charge for privileged categories of the population.
- In my opinion, it is necessary to start with simpler methods than artificial intelligence to ensure uniformity across the country in the future. But the very fact of introducing mandatory registration is a very positive trend," said, in turn, Anna Feldman, a specialist of the association "Animal Welfare" on interaction with the authorities and head of the fund "Kotospas".
How is the registration of animals in the regions
Note that in the Leningrad region, chipping is also possible, it is carried out at the expense of the owner. Biometric identification is an alternative free way of marking animals. So far it is obligatory to register dogs, but in the future the rule will be extended to cats. Leonid Krotov explained that fines from Br2 thousand for the lack of registration of an animal are also being introduced. They will take effect from July 1, 2025.
According to him, now the number of pets known to local authorities is 26,264 dogs and 36,553 cats - these are the animals, whose owners have applied to the state veterinary service for services. Full registration of all animals is planned within two years, Leonid Krotov said.
First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Ecology, Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Vladimir Burmatov told "Izvestia" that as of mid-December, 26 regions have already introduced registration of animals and this figure is constantly changing upwards. Now it is the regions' authority - they themselves determine whether it will be a mandatory or optional procedure, whether it is mandatory to register only dogs or cats as well, whether they will be chipped or not, etc.
One of the first regions to introduce compulsory registration of dogs was the Moscow region - this rule is in effect from September 1, 2023. Acting Minister of Agriculture and Food of the Moscow region Sergei Novikov told "Izvestia" that on December 12, 2024 in the Moscow region registered 9878 pets, including dogs - 9402. At the same time, there is no administrative responsibility for the lack of registration in the region.
Anna Feldman points out with reference to the calculations of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Moscow region that there are more than 250 thousand domestic dogs in the region, that is, no more than 4% of pets have been registered so far. Yuri Koretskikh believes that the small number of registered animals is primarily due to the fact that registration is mandatory, but there is no liability for failure to comply with this requirement.
Experts emphasize that penalties for refusal from mandatory registration are necessary, otherwise the problem will be solved only formally. At the same time, it is important that this does not lead to a large number of dogs thrown out into the street.
- And for this purpose the state should take responsibility for providing preferential registration and chipping at the transitional stage in the first one or two years after the entry into force of mandatory requirements, - said Yuri Koretskikh.
Irina Robas believes that it is especially important to make chipping free of charge in rural areas, where "90% of dogs are out on their own and the problem of stray animals is especially acute.
At the same time, the industry calls chipping itself an obligatory norm for bringing order in the sphere of animal treatment. Anna Feldman reminded that initially in the draft law "On Responsible Treatment of Animals" there was a norm on mandatory registration, but it fell out of the final text.
- In the sphere of animal treatment it is necessary to establish a connection "a specific animal - a specific person". But without a unified database and without the adoption of this norm at the federal level, the regions will not be able to clearly establish work on the identification of animals, because the owners with animals move around the country, - she said. - Currently, the relevant draft laws are being developed in a working group established under the Ministry of Natural Resources. The St. Petersburg City Council is also planning to submit a similar bill to the State Duma.
Vladimir Burmatov expressed confidence that the country will definitely come to a common database. But this will be the next step, while the regions are doing it on their own. And although everything is going well, the State Duma records that the instruction that the president gave to the Russian government to introduce a system of accounting and identification of animals has not yet been fulfilled at the federal level.
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