The first Latin America Summit was held in Panama in December with positive outcomes.
Building the breed, increasing membership numbers and offering more racing and showing opportunities for American Quarter Horses were the three main objectives that came out of the first-ever American Quarter Horse Association Latin America Summit in December in Panama.
Nine Latin America international affiliates were present from Argentina, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Uruguay, Venezuela and Costa Rica, which just recently filed to become an affiliate. The summit allowed these countries to present their concerns and questions to AQHA and enabled AQHA to develop a plan to address the unique situations that are encountered on a country by country basis.
AQHA’s Latin America plan is to:
• Provide judging workshops to encourage an increase in AQHA-approved judges in Latin America
• Develop plans to increase the number of shows and races in Latin America
• Investigate the possibility of a Latin America championship
• Expand breeding
• Streamline the registration process for eligible American Quarter Horses in Latin America
Having a Summit allows AQHA to make the Association’s goals clear to the international countries, says Tom Persechino, AQHA executive director of competition and breed integrity, who attended the summit. Increasing American Quarter Horse ownership, members, activities, youth involvement and discussing the ways AQHA can assist other countries are the major goals of the summit.
“AQHA is here for every country and recognizes the need, especially today, to be flexible and adaptable. We also need for international affiliates to compromise on some issues in order to move things through the system. It’s about taking…and giving.” said AQHA President Johannes Orgeldinger, who is the first international AQHA president. Orgeldinger is from Germany.
AQHA has more than 35 international affiliates with American Quarter Horses in 91 countries, totaling more than 5 million horses.
At the end of the Summit, it was decided to conduct an AQHA Latin America Summit every other year. International elected district directors, along with international affiliate directors from these regions, will be required to attend. These summits will address concerns specific to the region and help implement programs that will continue to expand the breed internationally.
The Latin America Summit was held nearly a year after the European Summit, which was in January 2010 in Germany. The Latin American Summit was funded in part by the American Quarter Horse License Plate Grant Program as administered by the Texas Department of Agriculture.
