12/04/2020

The forced shutdown of almost all businesses due to the coronavirus emergency is having a knock-on effect on all work environments and production activities.
However, it was disconcerting to see on a national television channel the appeal of a sports federation chairman and of some owners of equestrian centres for public aid and maybe even donations from private citizens in order to move forward.
Equestrian centres and sports associations, whether or not affiliated to FISE (Italian Equestrian Sports Federation), are in fact private bodies whose main purpose is to organize recreational or competitive activities using horses and ponies: how can you think of asking for government funds or donations to support a recreational sport? Also because the FISE is already regularly receiving support from CONI, as well as donations from public funds: in July last year, just as an example, they obtained funding of EUR 500,000 just to underpin a structure recovery in Rome. Money that could be redirected to their own clubs.

But perhaps what is most thought-provoking is that in the service they repeatedly admit that those animals must “work” in order to be maintained: does this mean that their right to life and welfare is closely tied to how much they can be used and, in many cases, exploited?
Is a one month stop enough to say that they might not be able to feed the animals?
So the doubts that we have been expressing for years as to old horses, or horses with health problems that make them unfit for use, are legitimate? Horses that at a certain point become “too much” for a world that is only willing to keep them as long as they produce income?

In this regard, the effect of the coronavirus is to mercilessly reveal the connection, arguable to say the least, between welfare and use, between love for animals and their productivity.
We must always remember that equestrian activities are imposed on animals who, if they were free to choose, would never do any of those “jobs”, nor want to live a life as prisoners in stalls, as seen in the tv broadcast.

Link to the Striscia La Notizia broadcast