Caring For Our Racehorses From Start To Finish Is Key

New developments aim to boost traceability and animal welfare

- Lucy Elder

NEW and improved ways to track the lives of horses in Britain after leaving racing are in the pipeline.

The racing industry is developing a system to log what happens to each horse on leaving training, simplifying paperwork and creating a rule to ensure accurate information is collected. This work is headed by the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) and Retraining of Racehorses (RoR).

A TV documentary raising allegations of the scale of equine wastage in Australia that showed shocking scenes of treatment of horses in slaughterhouses made international headlines. But the alleged situation is extremely different to and in no way representative of UK reality.

Around 7,000 horses leave training each year in Britain, and much is happening to ensure their welfare, but major developments are planned with the aim of better understanding what happens at each stage of racehorses’ lives.

Since January 2018, foal births must be registered within 30 days, down from a year. British racing’s Horse Welfare Board, which met for the first time in April, is working on projects linking to lifelong traceability and welfare, from the database to a welfare assessment tool and an appropriate euthanasia policy.

The hope is these will give the industry greater insight on whether there are pinch points or red flags where problems or loss of horses could be minimized.

“Measures are already being introduced to increase British racing’s ability to keep track of thoroughbreds before they enter training and after their racing careers,” RoR chief executive Di Arbuthnot told H&H.

“The BHA and RoR will be working closely together to strengthen the bridge between the detailed data racing have of horses in training and the data RoR has of horses active in second careers.