GERMANY (by Adriana van Tilburg) Perhaps in order to avoid joining the roster of disappearing studbooks – the Swedish national stud at Flyinge and the French Haras Nationaux – some German studbooks are pro-actively economizing by creating mergers, the most recent being between the Hanoverian Verband and the Rheinische Pferdestammuch.
The door to this merger was opened last year, when the process began which would result in the fusion between these two studbooks. Dur- ing the past few months there have been several meetings for breeders from the Hanoverian and the Rheinische Studbooks, con- cluding on December 1 with a meeting in Wickrath where the Olympic team gold medal winner Isabell Werth made the point: “The Hanoverian Verband is of- fering us an international platform to sell our horses. We have in Verden a true partner. We won’t get a chance like this again”.
After an over whelming ma- jority of members of the Rheinisches Pferdestamm- buch voted in favour of the merger, delegates from the Hannoveraner Verband were invited to cast their votes on Monday, Decem- ber 8, in Verden, at which 82 percent voted in favour of the merger, thus breath- ing life into this project for the future.
The chairmen of the two studbooks, Manfred Schae- fer and Theo Leuchten, as well as the two breeding and business managers, Dr. Werner Schade and Martin Spoo, answered a number of questions before the proj- ect was put up for vote. That 86 of the 105 Hanoverian delegates voted in favour of the project is a clear com- mitment to future develop- ment that will provide constructive commonality.
