Whenever and wherever we look across Australia, we see race fields of less than maximum numbers. Despite Menangle's much vaunted "huge" prizemoney, fields there are always less than capacity. This isn't new, but it is getting worse. The industry depends on turnover for income. Turnover depends on large fields. Large fields depend on a large racing pool.There is no escaping the fact that we do not have enough racing stock. We used to top up from NZ, but they are in a similar situation, with breeding numbers also dropping.
In Australia, there are two factors for this.
1. Less foals being born.
2.Wastage (the loss of horses before racing, or racing stock retiring too early). This includes:- loss of foals (snakes are very bad this year), accidents in the paddock or at the breakers, training incidents, illness, premature 2yo racing, etc etc. This is a huge and important topic, and hopefully HRA is studying ways of reducing it. They should examine the percentage of live foals that actually get to the races, and the factors why they don't.
1. Less foals being born....
2002...6362 foals,
2011...4787,
a decrease of 24.5% in 9 seasons. This year will be down also. Remembering that there is a 4 year lead time from the decision to breed (or not), to becoming a regular member of the racing pool, most of the current racing pool was conceived in 2008 or before. The future pool numbers are already in place, our current 2yos, yearlings, foals and embryos. We cannot change this number (except by reducing future wastage). We can only increase the pool after that by increasing matings in the upcoming season. With declining numbers since 2008, the future looks bleak. We are not alone of course. The thoroughbreds have similar falling numbers, but we must find a solution for our industry.
To solve the problem, we must first understand the problem.
Factors:
Breeders. As they retire/pass on, they are not being replaced by enough younger ones with the same passion, foresight or patience to carry the industry forward. Farm inheritors are selling off the farms and breeding stock, many of them not finding new homes. We are losing the breeding families, both equine and human. This is also not a problem just for us. Other farm related traditions are coming to an end as younger generations move away from rural lifestyles. We have to be proactive in helping younger generations get involved in the breeding industry.
Land: Horses need high quality pasture, or the feed therefrom. Whether you believe in climate change or not, extreme weather behavior has increased the cost of quality "safe" land, which increases the agistment cost. Marginal land has become riskier, and don't even mention mining.
Costs: Always rising, but relativity is the issue. Agistment & vets used to be minor inputs, now they are major costs. It was easy to give a mare a year off if required, but now it too expensive. This leads to more mares being disposed of instead. I would like to see HRA produce figures for every 10 years from 1960 - 2010, showing the relativity of service fees, yearling prices and prizemoney. This may give us an idea in which direction we are heading. Agistment and vet fees may be harder to correlate.
Structure: Most successful business models are based on a pyramid model (party plan, franchises etc). AFL is a great example. They allocate vast resources of staff, equipment, marketing etc across the country, building up the grassroots network. This grows a bigger pyramid, with a higher quality product at the top. Harness racing evolved from this model, where farmers had horses that they trained and raced, but then it became a centralised showpiece, losing the country base. The authorities have reversed this recently with Country Cups, Carnival of Cups, regional heat racing etc, bringing the sport back to its roots.
Except for the breeding sector. There, we have a "cream of the crop" structure, with top stallions heavily patronised and top horses in all classes racing for high prizemoney. As dairy farmers say, " You cannot make cream without making a lot of milk". We have a strong demand for the top of the crop, either for quality yearlings, or promising racehorses. This is fuelled by those owners who want to be in the top races, but don't want to wait 4 years to achieve this. That is fine, but that is only about 5% of the horses we need to make the industry viable.
Returns: Prizemoney goes up, but once again it is all relative. We have statebred schemes, Vicbred, futurity and stakes races, breeders bonuses etc, but this is obviously not good enough, because
 WE ARE STILL NOT BREEDING ENOUGH FOALS. The old business adage is "If you are not getting bigger, you are getting smaller". We are definitely getting smaller. Nobody is advocating breeding rubbish horses. There are plenty of commercial/successful sires who are under patronised. Every week there are quality mares on the "Trading Ring" for free or very little, but not many of them change hands for breeding purposes.
The broodmare owners are the ones deciding not to breed. This must change.
Broodmares: Currently only 65% of mares served produce a live foal. This figure has been in the 60 percentile for a long time, and I am not a vet, but wouldn't it be wonderful if we could get this up to 80 or 90%? The HRA should be working with vets and studmasters to see if it can be improved. I am guessing the human equivalent is much higher.
Conclusions:
We do not have enough racehorses.
There are less, not more, on the way.
Most of the industry promotes itself well, but if the trend is not reversed NOW, in a relatively short time there will be no industry to promote.
Please discuss