2025 Conference Report
Kateryna Scherbyna, Ukraine: (Illustrated with video)
Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Kateryna Scherbyna, the Registrar and Head of the Breeding Committee of the Arabian Horse Association of Ukraine. My co-delegate is Tetiana Ilnytska, President of the Ukrainian Horse Breeding Association. It is our pleasure to attend a WAHO Conference for the first time. First of all, I would like to thank our esteemed and generous hosts, the Emirates Arabian Horse Society and especially His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan and His Excellency Sheikh Zayed bin Hamad Al Nahyan. Your generosity is incredible.
Our first ever volume of the Ukrainian Arabian Stud Book covers the period from 1991 until 2024. Although the numbers are relatively small, I would like to take this opportunity to give you a little background to our history. Ukraine has always been a horse-breeding country as far back as thousands of years according to the most recent research, and horses have remained important to this day. The Arabian horses of Ukraine actually have a very long and distinguished history of which we are really proud, to share with the history of Arabian breeding in neighbouring Poland. Many of the great Polish Arabian breeders of the 19th century had vast estates in what is now northern and western Ukraine, where they bred hundreds of Arabian horses of the finest quality. Despite the turbulent times, the wars and destruction, many of the horses bred at these iconic stud farms can still be found in pedigrees today, including some of the most precious mare lines in the world.
As times changed, so did the fortunes of Arabian horses in Ukraine. Since 1976, when a large group of horses were imported from Tersk Stud Farm, there has been an Arabian breeding programme at the State Stud, Yahilnytsa, which is still in existence but with a much reduced number of Arabians. Until 1992 these horses were always registered in the Soviet Union Arabian Stud Book and so were automatically WAHO approved. When this arrangement ceased our State Stud, as well as the small number of private breeders found themselves with no Registry, but the breeding programmes continued and foals were still being born.
As interest in Arabian horses increased, and the sport of endurance in particular became popular, we knew we had to make a start on an independent stud book. So the Arabian Horse Association of Ukraine was formed as a branch of the Ukrainian Horse Breeding Association (U.H.B.A.), which has been in existence and approved by our Government since 2000. In 2012 the U.H.B.A. created the Ukrainian Sport Horse Register and their practical experience of registering horses and managing a Registry, with the horses all microchipped and DNA typed, and their passports EU compliant, has been invaluable to us.
So, we started gathering information on all the living Arabians in our country to present to WAHO in order to have our Stud Book accepted into the WAHO Definition. Formal application for our Applying Membership was made and accepted in 2018, and at the WAHO Conference in Australia in 2019, when a full report was presented to the Delegates, we were very proud to be accepted by your votes as an Applying Registering Authority Member of WAHO. At that time, we knew of about 70 Arabians in the country, some of them not yet located, and about 10 foals were born each year.
Despite many difficulties since then, especially in the last 3 years as I am sure you can understand, we have managed to unite the owners of Arabians, to study archival documents, to locate and check the horses and to arrange DNA and parent verification. We have worked closely with the WAHO Office, ensuring that all our registration procedures and documents are in accordance with WAHO rules. Several colleagues from other WAHO Member Registries, many of them here with us today, have helped us to complete our work and we are very grateful for their assistance and support. We are pleased to announce that we have now finished the final draft of the first Volume of our Stud Book, which has been submitted to WAHO for approval.
I must also mention the owners of Arabian horses in Ukraine. Because of their extraordinary efforts, not a single purebred Arabian horse has been lost from the hostilities. As you will appreciate, it is not currently possible to carry out any equestrian sports, but we are managing to hold some small national-level endurance competitions. However, good can sometimes emerge from bad times. In 2018 we started cooperation with the Veteran and Adaptive Equestrian Federation of Ukraine. Together we organize para-endurance competitions and continue the joint project ‘Riding into the Future’ for combat veterans and their families. Equine-assisted therapy and adapted equestrian sports are both very effective methods used worldwide to help adults and children dealing with physical or mental disabilities, as well as many different consequences of war. Arabian horses, because of their specific recognizable appearance and sensitivity, evoke a lot of positive emotions in people and are willing to cooperate with us. We teach people to build this unique dialogue with an Arabian horse, that requires full concentration from a person and always gives a comprehensive answer from the horse itself. Already almost 2,000 individuals have been helped through this project. We are ready to share our unique experience of rehabilitation through equestrian assisted services, both riding and non-riding. We are open to any form of cooperation aimed at the well-being of both humans and horses.
Let me thank our generous hosts and the entire WAHO team once again for this incredible opportunity to attend this Conference, to tell you a little about our country, and to share with all of you our admiration for the unique creature we are all here for – the Arabian horse.
Thank you.
