Workshop organised by FEI to improve regulations across Asia

Let’s turn our attention away from the Hong Kong Masters for a moment to focus on another important event this weekend which is taking place in the same location.
This weekend the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) is holding a 3 day workshop on animal health which will be run by experts from 20 nations.
It will be taking place at the Happy Valley Racecourse in Hong Kong and has been organised in collaboration with FEI, the International Federation of Horseracing Authorities (IFHA), the Hong Kong Jockey Club and the ministers for agriculture in Hong Kong.
The workshop will focus on the increasing global rise of equestrian sports in the last 10 years and the social and economic benefits which have strengthened riders’ development on the world stage.
At the same time however, the equestrian sector faces great challenges with many health regulations not respected and applied in the same manner in Asia and other parts of the world.
The aforementioned workshop is aimed at promoting a health system that is more capable of regulating the equestrian sector and in particular the transport of horses ahead of competitions.
Many of these ideas will be based on the current OIE principles and will be discussed by experts from: Australia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, Taipei, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, New Caledonia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Korea and Vietnam.
The new ideas will then be presented at the OIE general assembly which is scheduled for the 25th of May through to the 30th of May in Paris before being voted on by 178 member countries.
The new proposals put forward would also allow emerging countries to play a bigger part in the development of the equestrian sector which so far has been dominated by the European and North American countries.
It’s vital that the regulations for the movement and transport of horses is unified on a global scale, especially now that more and more competitions are taking place in Asia.
The idea is to present the standardised European and North American regulation and use this framework as a launching pad for greater unity in Asia and other parts of the world.