BY JEAN LLEWELLYN / PRESS RELEASE

A milestone in horse breeding: Thanks to enormous collaborative efforts, it's finally here: The world's largest genomically supported breeding value estimation system is launching.

Previously, breeding selection relied largely on the reliable assessment and recording of desired traits. It was always a matter of hoping that environmental factors wouldn't obscure the true genetic predispositions. Genomic analysis now offers the invaluable advantage of being able to directly determine the hereditary predispositions for many traits from the horse's genotype, thus enabling far more reliable breeding selection.

A breeding planning tool

This new system is a true milestone in modern horse breeding as, for the first time, traits of physical appearance, performance, and health can be directly linked to genetic predispositions. With the publication of genomically supported breeding values for traits from linear descriptions, breeders gain access to valuable information that they can incorporate into their selection and mating decisions.
Based on this, an online mating program was developed that suggests a selection of suitable mating partners for a breeder’s mare. This is fully customizable according to the breeder’s individual breeding goals, which are accessed through their online account. The breeder still makes the final decision regarding their preferred stallion.
The International Association of Future Horse Breeding GmbH & Co KG breeding values of the stallions are now available free of charge to all breeders belonging to IAFH member associations in their respective online stallion distribution plans.

Extensive database

The foundation consists of information collected by the IAFH over 14 years of systematic data collection on individual criteria that can be significant for breeding decisions. These include 28 conformation traits, 19 movement traits, and 12 jumping traits, for whose breeding classification the linear profiles of a total of nearly 84,000 horses are used. The data was contributed by six horse breeding associations, covering the majority of German Warmblood breeding. A pool of over 130,000 genotyped horses enables the assignment of conformation and performance traits to specific genotypes, which the vit data center ensures using state-of-the-art evaluation methods...

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