ECONOMIST Jim Power and leading sport horse agent Barry O’Connor travelled to Europe last month in order to develop further Power’s report on the Irish Sport Horse industry, which will be launched towards the end of March.

O’Connor, who formed the 20-strong Irish Sport Horse Industry Group and hired Power to conduct the study in 2016, said the case study comparingIreland with Europe makes for “very interesting reading” and will progress the report.

The study was based on Holland, where the duo visited equestrian centres, sales barns and breeding facilities to get a feel for how the industry runs in the KWPN country, ranked second in the WBFSH show jumping rankings.

“Jim (Power) wanted to see the standards and the investments over there, so that is why it is taking a bit longer. The report is in draft form and makes for very interesting reading,” O’Connor said.

The Malahide-based agent promised the report will be launched in March (with a provisional date of March 20th), with a lobbying timetable for the summer budget.

The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) allocated an extra €500,000 to HSI in Budget 2018, however, Minister Creed has said the recommendations in the Indecon Report must be implemented before any larger funding from Government.

O’Connor added: “The Minister has told us that until the report is finished and the new structure of HSI is in place, there will be no extra funding. So hopefully by the middle of the year, we should be all systems go.”

The UCD Report, published in October 2017, highlighted the importance of the industry to the economy, with expenditure of €816m and supporting over 14,000 full-time jobs.

€110,000 allocated for WEG

Sport Ireland announced the 2018 funding allocation for National Governing Bodies (NGBs) and High Performance programmes at the Sport Ireland National Indoor Arena in Abbotstown on Thursday.

Horse Sport Ireland has again received €755,000, the same amount as 2017. HSI received the fourth highest allocation of the 57 NGBs, excluding the big three of the GAA, FAI and IRFU.

Horse Sport Ireland’s High Performance programme was allocated €530,000, an identical figure to last year’s funding, however, the NGB was boosted by an extra one-off allocation of €110,000 to assist participation in the 2018 World Equestrian Games, taking place in North Carolina this September.

A HSI spokesperson welcomed the announcement: “This additional funding provided by Sport Ireland is very welcome and will be targeted towards the substantial cost of transporting horses to the World Equestrian Games in Tryon, North Carolina, USA.

“This funding will not however cover all of the costs involved. Horse Sport Ireland have a number of fundraising initiatives - including the Team Ireland Equestrian Eventing Demo Tour - aimed at raising funds for the Irish squad on their journey to Tryon.”