Starting Tuesday December 5th, professional camera equipment will be installed in all riding halls at the three locations that belong to Helgstrand Dressage in Denmark. Henceforth, all riding and training will be recorded at all hours of the day.
"As we continue our efforts to ensure the highest level of animal welfare in riding and training, we have now set up monitoring in all riding halls, so we can use the footage if we are alerted to bad riding or unethical training methods. In the future, the Danish Equestrian Federation and the relevant authorities can conduct random checks at any time, naturally taking into account applicable legislation," explains commercial director, Anders Bjørnstrup.
Helgstrand Dressage already had a camera setup in the riding hall at a single location, Helgstrand Academy. This was for the purpose of safety monitoring rather than review of training and therefore not of sufficient quality. New and far more professional equipment is now being installed in all riding halls.
"I would like to make it clear that there is no talk of a systematic review of our training, but if a situation arises, we can go back and review for clarification with the help of long-range cameras. We also see this as security measure for our employees, horses and riders," emphasizes Anders Bjørnstrup.
Critical recordings
The measure comes in the wake of recordings of poor riding at Helgstrand Dressage, which were recorded in January 2023. Since then, we have worked intensively to introduce a wide range of measures and improvement points for our animal welfare, business conduct and conditions for our employees. Among other things, we have introduced a whistleblower program and tightened the guidelines for training and treatment of horses.
"I hope that the new camera placements can help to reassure both the federation and the authorities, that riding and training is done properly," states Anders Bjørnstrup.
For further information, please contact the press department at presse@helgstranddressage.dk
