ECONOMIST Jim Power, author of the Sport Horse Alliance report ’Untapped Potential: Unlocking the Economic Potential of the Irish Sport Horse Industry’, told Tuesday’s Joint Oireachtas Agriculture Committee that the sector needed €100 million in government funding over the next five years.

“We would need €100 million over the next five years in our industry but realise the competing demands. With Brexit as well, that will have a serious effect on the lower end of our market because the UK takes about 40% of our horses,” said Power who outlined that Horse Sport Ireland put in for €13.1 million in funding from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine but got just an extra €500,000, bringing funding to some €3 million.