Quote Originally Posted by Greg Hando View Post
I think the higher import fee's are a good idea it can only help promote our own breeding industry that is sadly lacking in incentives to breed that 1 extra wether to race yourself or sell
in the education,training strategy to get live foals to track i believe a lot of horses just aren't given enough time because the owner's want that early 2yo money if they don't come up quick a lot of them are invariably dogged for the simple reason they weren't mature enough at that stage of their life and because of the cost's are got rid of because of lack of patience and being able to give them time as another 12 month's is more dead money in agistment cost's etc
Hi Greg

I agree with raising the import fee but to $5k for a colt is absurd, maybe they should of lifted it from $500 to $2k at most but thats just my opinion and fillies and mare's should be kepted at there same fee as the majority of them become future broodmare's in our country. I don't think this will change people's idea's on keeping horses and breeding 1 more mare per year as we can see now the decline of breeding has already started and people prefer to buy a yearling or a going horse which takes a lot of risks out from rearing a foal and so on. You can buy decent yearling's these day's for not much more than the service fee sometime's. Some people don't want horses sitting in a paddock for 12 months whilst still outlaying money on agistment, worming, hoof trimming and getting there teeth done they mostly listen to there trainers and if he say's the horse ain't know good or might win 1 at most whats the use of spelling paying agistment and then 12wks pay to the trainer to get that horse to the track to win 1 race you will be running at a loss.