To comply with an EU directive that aims to ensure that all horses that have been treated with veterinary medicines are not slaughtered for human consumption, all horses now have to have an equine passport that shows the individual horses history.
The Government and the horse industry believe that other benefits will also  be realised if all horses have a passport. For example, by discouraging the indiscriminate breeding of horses and ponies that may be of low quality or value.
Further benefits will be realised from the proposed National Equine Database (NED) that will record details of every horse issued with a passport in the UK. This will improve the ability to monitor disease and prevent outbreaks because information about the numbers of horses and contact details for owners will be available. It is envisaged that the NED will provide the equine industry with information for enhanced breeding programmes and research.
The British Horse Society issues equine passports for horses, ponies, mules and donkeys whose breeding is unknown, or who are not eligible for registration with a breed society. As From July 1st 2009 all horses, ponies, mules and donkeys being issued with a passport for the first time have also had to be microchipped and will be entered on to the National Equine Database.
Therefore, after this date, all applications have had to be submitted with the relevant microchip information for the animal. Failure to produce this documentation will result in the application being rejected.
What is the National Equine Database?
The National Equine Database (NED) is a unique database that contains information about every horse, pony, donkey or mule with a UK passport. Basic details such as age, colour, height are available to view free of charge.
Performance, progeny and pedigree details, where available, can be viewed for a registration fee.
Request an Application Form
To request an application form contact the BHS passport office on 01926 707839 or passports@bhs.org.uk. If applying via email, forward your full postal address and specify how many applications you need.
Completing the Application
There are two options when applying for a BHS equine passport:
⢠Ask your vet to complete the application, ensuring that they sign and stamp the application form.
⢠If your animal has a vaccination certificate that has been previously completed, stamped and signed by a vet then you may submit this document with the application.
Animal Name
Please note that your horses name will have to be checked and any horse name that consists of more than one word will be checked against the Central Prefix Register, because each word is checked individually.
For example, if you wished to call your horse Prime Happy Lad, the components âPrimeâ  âHappyâ and âLadâ would each need to be checked individually. If any of the words show as unavailable then you will be unable to use them.
What Not to Do!
Applications will be rejected for the following reasons:
⢠Do not submit a BHS passport application with a pre-purchase examination document or vetting certificate to be used as the identification silhouette
⢠Do not submit an application without the relevant microchip information
⢠Do not submit incomplete applications. Height, colour, date of birth and microchip details must all be completed.
⢠Do not send an application completed with breed details, as they will not include that information. If you know your horseâs breed then you need to apply for the passport via the relevant breed society.
This is just brief overview, for more details contact âThe British Horse Societyâ and they will steer you in the right direction.
The Stable Doctor
https://primestables.co.uk/news
Research –Â The British Horse Society
Advice is given without legal responsibility
