Horseracing in Vietnam will move closer to matching international standards as older jockeys begin replacing the child riders who now dominate the industry.
From next month, Thien Ma Company will begin recruiting jockeys aged 18 and older to ride 80 thoroughbreds that will be imported from Australia early next year.
Thien Ma Company is one of the organizers of horseracing at Phu Tho track in Ho Chi Minh City, the only place in Vietnam to host horse races every weekend and allow public betting.
The future of the race track was thrown into doubt in May this year when authorities announced a crackdown on child labor laws, which ban the employment of children aged under 16.
The track currently has 50 professional jockeys, 40 of whom are children, according to one track employee. Some of the jockeys are as young as 12.
Phu Tho has around 850 registered race horses but only 10 of are “Western-size” thoroughbreds, weighing around 750 kilograms.
Most of the horses are Vietnamese race horses, which weigh just 250 kilograms and stand 1.4 meters high at the shoulder.
Owners of the small Vietnamese horses want their jockeys to weigh less than 38 kilograms, a limit that – even in Vietnam – mostly only children can meet.
The minimum riding weight in Australia, including the saddle, is 53 kilograms for jockeys riding in the city and 54 kilograms at country tracks.
Thien Ma Director Nguyen Ngoc My said his company planned to recruit fit and healthy adults who weighed less than 40 kilograms as jockeys. A certain amount of strength was also required to manage such strong animals, My said.
However, My would not say whether Thien Ma would impose a minimum weight for its jockeys. Most other countries impose a minimum riding weight for jockeys for safety reasons.
Vietnam does not use a handicap system to determine the weight to be carried by each horse. So lighter jockeys have an advantage in horse races.
The pressure on jockeys to maintain a low body weight can lead to health problems and eating disorders.
However, the horses face no such pressure. Only horses of similar weights will compete in the same race, so Australian thoroughbreds will not be pitted against Vietnamese horses one-third their weight.
Source: vietnews