News from ECAHO

ECAHO General Meeting 2018 in Munich

.

.

Last weekend, the delegates of 25 ECAHO Member countries met on the invitation of the VZAP at Munich, to hold their Annual General Meeting. During this occasion, Slovakia was accepted as a new Full Member, while Bahrain and Palestine were upgraded from Associate to Full Member. Finland terminated its membership.
Despite some “shit storms” on Facebook ahead of the conference, the meeting was held in a quiet atmosphere and all votings and elections were either unanimous or with a convincing majority. President Jaroslav Lacina explained in his Presidents Report that he feels it is the responsibility of the National Organisations to inform their members in due time about any new rules and other developments.
Good news was spread with regards to the results database. In it, the results of appr. 1200 shows are collected (and ECAHO collects the results of their affiliated shows since 1985), processed and eventually will be on display online (www.ecaho.org)
The Chairman of the Show Commission, Nils Ismer, explained that there are new procedures for affiliating shows, to avoid clashes of dates as far as possible. The respective deadlines for application will be announced in time. Apart from that, there are changes / amendments with regards to “Conflict of Interest”, which will become effective once the Blue Book 2018 is published.
All Officials (Judges, DCs, Ring stewards, etc.) have signed a contract with ECAHO which includes the coverage by an insurance. However, arrival and departure are not included and therefore it is strongly recommended to have a travel or foreign health insurance. Show organizers are informed that they need to have a civil liability insurance to be able to affiliate a show with ECAHO.
Three DC Members passed their exams to be moved from the B to the A list of DC Members; these are Farhang Fazeli (Iran), as well as Peter Hegemann and Kerstin Wisniowski (Germany). One position within the Standing Disciplinary Committee was vacant and had to be filled again. The decision of the board fell on Christine Keyser, who in turn was confirmed unanimously by the members. Christine Keyser comes from Norway and has professionally to do with identity and security checks of immigrants.
Nils Ismer introduced the project “ECAHO for good Horsemanship” (download pdf: ) and asked for support and ideas. The Belgian Association (BAPS) for example brought forward their request, to limit the noise level (music) at shows, supported by scientific papers on the noise perception / hearing of horses.
Gideon Reisel, Chairman of the Registrars Meeting, explained to his commission the most recent changes in EU Regulations. Apart from that, he informed that there is a new genetic test for OAAM (Occipito-Atlanto-Axiale Malformation), a genetic defect about which we will report at a later date.
With regards to “Sports”, the newly re-elected Chairman Sissi Chat reported that the next European Championships for Sports Arabians will be held on 26-29 July 2018 at Wiener Neustadt, appr. 30 km South of Vienna. She feels, that the sport with Arabian horses is on the increase, as in 2017 there were 12 ECAHO affiliated sports events, at which 7 nations participated and which covered three different levels of difficulty (novice, advanced, master). Apart from this, a Highpoint System was introduced, the results for 2016 can be viewed at the ECAHO Website, the results for 2017 are still pending.
With the death of Nasr Marei, whom the meeting remembered with a minute of silence, one seat in the Executive Committee of ECAHO was vacant. The following persons were nominated as candidates by the members: Sultan Al Yahyaee from the UAE, as well as Renata Schibler, President of the Swiss Arab Horse Breeding Society (SZAP). Renata Schibler was elected with 30 to 20 votes and will take the seat in the Executive Committee for the next four years.
At the end, four persons, who had made a special contribution to ECAHO since its inception, were honored with the honorary membership:

  • Joanna Maxwell, successful breeder of five World Champions and ghostwriter of Pat Maxwell’s speeches, the long-term President of ECAHO until 2000.
  • Sami Al Nohait, the long-term delegate from Saudi Arabia and manager of the Dirab Arabian Horse Center, etc.
  • Peter Upton, former board member, judge and instructor for judges, as well as a gifted artist who has created many drawings for the judge’s courses.
  • Dr. Hans-Joachim Nagel, former board member, judge and successful breeder.

Following the meeting, Melissa Cox gave a very interesting presentation on genetic diseases and genomics, which will be explained in greater detail at a later time.
-gw-