IT’S been a remarkable 12 months in the Irish horse world. In that short space of time, we have seen our national show jumping team bring home Aga Khan glory from the RDS with team member Tipperary’s Greg Broderick, pulling off a double clear at the five-star show mounted on the Irish-bred MHS Going Global, bred by the Brennans of Mill House Stud, Co Kilkenny.

We have also seen Goresbridge post the record-breaking sale of the Irish-bred Dougie Douglas for €1.4m and the meteoric rise of Wexford show jumping superstar Bertram Allen, already at the top of his game at the tender age of 20. We have world-class horses and world-class riders and it’s a message we should be shouting from the rooftops.

Also in the last 12 months, we have seen the launch of not one but two major government-backed reports into the €700m Irish Sport Horse Industry – a sector that is approximately twice the size of Ireland’s sheep industry and gives employment to over 12,000 people.

Those two statistics alone prompted Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney, to remark last Budget Day, that the Irish sport horse industry is “not to be sneezed at”.

Last February, the same minister officially launched the Reaching new heights 10-year strategy document at McKee Barracks – the result of a series of nationwide meetings organised by Teagasc, the RDS and Horse Sport Ireland. It attracted a huge audience across every strata of the industry: breeders, owners, riders, producers, buyers, sellers, dealers – in each region.

It was broadly welcomed by all in attendance and heralded as a “game changer” by chairman of Horse Sport Ireland Professor Pat Wall, as a blueprint vision that would effectively put our vibrant, colourful industry on both a more professional and accountable footing going forward towards 2025.

In recent weeks, the joint Oireachtas agriculture committee published its report on the Irish Horse Industry – both sport horse and thoroughbred – putting forward almost 50 recommendations, largely aimed at injecting new supports into the industry.

We now have two major reports on the shelves, each bursting at the seams with impressive data that build an insightful picture of the depth of our industry and the economic contribution it makes on so many levels, be it through employment, direct and indirect taxes, ancillary spin-offs, the growth of equine tourism, not to mention further education.

A quick reminder of some of the main findings of these reports shows that, with approximately 124,000 horses and ponies in Ireland, we are the most densely sport-horse-populated country in Europe.

The breeding sector accounts for 73,000 registered sports horses and contributes €226m per annum to the economy, while the competition sector has approximately 10,000 registered sport horses and brings an additional €135m per annum to the country’s coffers. The size of the leisure sector is often taken for granted, but with 36,000 registered sport horses, it contributes €119m.

Some 140 country shows nationwide attract over 500,000 spectators, with five per cent coming from overseas. Equestrian tourism attracts almost 100,000 visitors each year, resulting in an estimated spend of €79m. The Dublin Horse Show alone generated €43m in 2012 with €3m contributed to overseas visitors.

However, a starker breeding picture emerges when you look at the latest WBFSH eventing and show-jumping rankings. After the Irish Sport Horse Studbook holding the No 1 spot in the eventing rankings for 19 of the last 21 years, it has now been overtaken and has dropped to fourth.

Similarly, the decline in our production of the best show jumpers in the last 30 years saw Ireland languish in 12th position by 2014, and the percentage of Irish-bred horses competing in the Nations Cup teams at the RDS fell from 35% in 1982 to just 3% in 2014.

Declining horsepower over recent decades at the upper performance levels is a challenge that must be met with targeted breeding strategies, properly funded and resourced. Last year in this breeding guide, we called for such breeders to be directly supported for producing the product that the market demands, similar to the supports offered to other contributing sectors to the economy.

If we are guilty of one thing as an industry, it is perhaps not speaking with a cohesive, strong voice to the powers that be, putting forward the case for more necessary supports and targeted funding schemes.

Does the climb back up the WBFSH rankings start on the steps of Leinster House? Should Ireland’s flagship horse industry have its own dedicated ministry?

As I write, General Election 2016 has just returned a virtual rainbow of parties to the political table. As they move into their new Dáil offices, let’s hope they don’t ignore the findings and recommendations of those two reports on the shelves over their heads.

Verdict on the last 12 months: a lot done, more to do.