Why do New Zealand vets recommend Royal Canin so often?

A few reasons, and most of them are pretty fair once you understand them. Royal Canin puts serious effort into the veterinary world. They fund research, they run nutrition training for clinics, and their therapeutic diets, the prescription formulas for things like kidney disease or urinary issues, are well studied and reliable. When a vet needs a diet they can trust to do a specific medical job, Royal Canin is a known quantity. That's a legitimate reason to reach for it.

There's the familiarity factor too. A product that's consistent batch to batch, stocked everywhere, and backed by a big support team is an easy thing to recommend with confidence. Your vet has seen it work across hundreds of dogs, and nobody wants to suggest something unpredictable for a patient they care about.

Here's the bit that's easy to miss, though. Vets are trained in medicine, not usually in food formulation or ingredient sourcing. A recommendation often means 'this is a reliable, well-supported product', which isn't quite the same as 'this has the best ingredients for the money'. For a dog with a real medical condition, follow your vet's advice to the letter. For a healthy dog on an everyday bag, it's completely fair to read the label yourself and compare what you're getting. Plenty of NZ-made foods put better meat higher up the ingredient list.