The Hague: Khalid Al Naboudah, one of the UAE’s leading owner-breeder of Purebred Arabian horses, said the local breeding industry overcame many challenges before meeting with success.

Khalid, who over the last two years emerged as the leading owner of Purebred Arabian horses in the Wathba Stud farm Cup series aimed at small and private owners, along with another Emirati owner addressed the opening session of the Second World Arabian Racing Conference which is being held here over three days.

“There were many challenges for breeders in the UAE and we did face many problems. However, over the years we learned from our mistakes and in the end we got a horse that could run. Now we want to get better and better,” said Al Naboudah.

“In the beginning when we embarked on breeding in our country many in the world were against breeding in the Gulf region. They felt it was not conducive and for us that was the challenge,” he said.

“The main problem was the heat and climate. We can’t even grow any grass and even if we do, they do not have the necessary minerals. Importing of hay is very expensive. But we wanted to breed at home and we wanted to see our ‘baby’ grow in front of our eyes,” Al Naboudah said.
“We needed to put our experience and our touch into it,” he said.

“The choice of feeding was also important. We needed to choose feed that was used by horses that have similar climatic conditions like the US and Australia. Nutrition was another challenge,” the Emirati owner said at the conference in Netherlands.