4,301 racehorses and 2,681 broodmares have been imported from the U.S. since 1994. Almost all of the racehorses are yearling and two-year-old purchases from U.S. auctions.
RYAN GOLDBERG: ‘It’s long been taboo to eat horse meat in the U.S… In America, eating horse meat has been associated with desperate, troubled times during war or revolution or famine. Most other countries don’t harbor this taboo, and Korea has a tradition of eating horse meat that goes back thousands of years… That South Korea’s supply of horse meat comes in part from American racehorses is basically unknown in the American racing world, even though it’s an open secret there and the subject of retirement has become a major concern here and worldwide. Instead, most of the focus is on Korean racing’s spectacular growth, largely due to these acquisitions of American bloodstock…
Jun Park, a U.S.-based bloodstock consultant who buys American horses for Korean owners, said that when he first began working in American horse racing 20 years ago, “People asked me if I was from Japan. Nobody even knew Korea had horse racing.” American sales companies have certainly welcomed South Korea’s growing investment. In 2010, after 92 horses were bought for export to Korea at Ocala’s spring sale, or 12.4 percent of the total sold, Tom Ventura, now its president, noted, “They have been very good customers for the last four or five years.” In 2013, Fasig-Tipton’s director of marketing, Terence Collier, told the Daily Racing Form that if all goes well, Korea “is going to be a market that’s going to be very productive for us for a long time.”
According to the KRA, 4,301 racehorses and 2,681 broodmares have been imported from the U.S. since 1994. Almost all of the racehorses are yearling and two-year-old purchases from U.S. auctions… In South Korea horse racing falls under the country’s Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, which means that horse racing goes hand-in-hand with the raising and processing of horses for food for human consumption. Indeed, the Korean Racing Authority (KRA) publishes quarterly spreadsheets of the horses slaughtered during that period… Between 2003 and 2014 the number of horses sent to slaughter tripled, from 315 to 1,036, according to government figures published by the since-shuttered Korea Observer. Last year, that number was 1,249. More than three-quarters of those were killed at Nonghyup’s plant on Jeju… The chairman of the KRA told the Korea Times said “Horse meat is good and we will work on ways of encouraging people to eat it in the future”.’ SOURCE…
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