A Fresh Start

Oh, the January edition just made it .... Firstly, a very Happy New Year from all of us at the National Office. Having moved into a new building gives us a feeling as though we were starting afresh in many ways, and in some, we really are. We are, of course, still governed by our Strategic Plan for 2005 - 2009 and the objectives to be achieved with the Operational Plans that flow from it. This alone gives us more than enough work. The office move itself went relatively smoothly but the relocation from Adelaide to Sydney seemed much easier. The new location is just one driveway up from the previous one but the new environment asks for more self-reliance than before. No more landlords to lean on. We need to organise things ourselves. There were also a couple of changes in the office staffing.  Mandy King joined us just before Christmas as the Sport Consultant - High Performance.  Monique Schaefer leaves us this Friday to take up a position at Yachting Australia. Leanne Kingsbury will take her position of Sport Consultant - Administration & Insurance from tomorrow. We welcome our new staff members and wish Monique, who joined us when the National Office moved to Sydney in July 2003, all the best in her new role. Environmental and Climate Change On our home page, we presently have the following feature story: Tim Flannery has been named “Australian of the Year” for his contribution to the environmental and climate debate. It is good to see that governments around the country and the globe are beginning to take these issues more seriously. Looking at equestrian sport, climate change will have a dramatic impact, particularly in Australia, as will other factors and changes like greater urbanisation and fewer trails and parks to ride in, even lower numbers of male participants, an ageing population, increasing fuel prices, etc., etc. We have to find ways that will reverse or at least lessen the effects. Let's work together and find solutions. Our Horse Deals EFA News editor Samantha Hain has further developed the theme (see PDF file) and wonders whether you have any suggestions to make. E-mail issues One of the things that did not quite work out as well as expected was the "re-provisioning" of our ADSL line. The delays meant that not all mail sent to us at efanational.com from 21 December 2006 to 02 January 2007 was in fact delivered, so if you wrote to us during that period and have not received a reply, please se-send your e-mail. Our web address is www.equestrian.org.au What we also noticed was that when the ADSL line to our in-house e-mail and web server efanational.com was interrupted, traffic to our web site www.equestrian.org.au dropped immediately by two-thirds and on reconnection "recovered" as quickly. This seems to indicate that many of our visitors still use the www.efanational.com address (URL), which requires re-direction from our server. It would be a good idea to update the URL if you are still using the old one.  We made the change 18 months ago and will cancel the old domain name in due course. Thanks. 2007 National Squads National Selectors have just released the squads for the Olympic sports of Dressage, Eventing and Jumping. We had announced last December that this publication would take place on 15 January 2007 but delays with the receipt of squad agreements caused a postponement. In fact, a couple of agreements are still to be finalised, hopefully this week. It is now a requirement, as in other sports funded by the Australian Sports Commission, for squad members (and in our case also for horse owners) to sign squad member agreements that outline the rights and responsibilities of the parties. Any change of system or the introduction of anything new often leads to reluctance to accept the new situation. Clauses in agreements always leave some scope for interpretation and the "angle" from which they are viewed is often different for riders and owners on the one hand and the EFA on the other. We had, however, invited riders and owners to raise any issues they had with the contracts. A number of them did. A few of them suggested changes to some clauses to better suit their individual situation, changes which we then included in their agreement. We have noted all comments and concerns raised (and changes made already) and will take them into account in the on-going review of the document. On the other hand, some riders were not willing to enter into ANY agreement. And there are a few others whose agreements still need to be finalised and who will be added to the squads when that has happened. Equitana Asia Pacific has a new venue for 2007 This year's edition of Equitana will be held at the re-developed Melbourne Showgrounds. Read more in a press release but put the dates of the show in your diary right now: 15-18 November 2007. How things work in the EFA Last year we started a monthly series of notes that try to explain how the Federation and the sport function. With the office move and the Christmas/New Year break, we had to postpone the next issue to February: Too much other work, no "how things work"! February is a short month, however, so those of you who have been reading these notes will not have to wait too long. Supporters and Sponsors I cannot close without thanking our funding agencies, sponsors and supporters. In particular, we would like to mention the Australian Sports Commission, our Principal Sponsor, the Australian Olympic Committee,  Horseland,  Kentucky Equine Research and Ridley Agriproducts, Horse Deals magazine, and  Aon Risk Management Services. Make it a good day! Franz Venhaus Chief Executive Officer

National Squads for 2007 announced The National Selection Panels for the sports of Dressage, Eventing and Jumping have confirmed the National Squads for 2007.

AUS Team wins friendly NZL Young Rider Derby Australian Young Riders Jayden Brown (Qld.) and Lilah Nieuwland (Vic.) have won the Yorke Corporation Trans Tasman Derby at the Lion Foundation New Zealand Young Rider Championships in Ashburton (NZL) on 21 January 2007. Congratulations!

EFA Dressage Committee - Nominations close 28 February 2007 In a ground-breaking move, the EFA Dressage Committee unanimously agreed to implement a non-representational ('skills-based') structure in 2007.

Gavin Chester wins 2006-07 Australian World Cup League Gavin Chester and Warlord II have won the 2006-07 series of the Australian League of the FEI World Cup Jumping.

EFA Jumping Rule Changes for 2007 At its July 2006 meeting, the EFA National Jumping Committee decided to introduce a number of changes to Jumping rules in EFA competition, effective 01 January 2007.

Aussie Young Riders win Bangalore, India, CSI-Y Tim Bowman, Brad Hearn and Hayden Kneebone had a successful trip to the Bangalore CSI-Y held 28 - 30 December 2006.

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If you have any comments about this newsletter or our website, or want to contribute, you can email us. The Equestrian Federation of Australia 's postal address is PO Box 673, SYDNEY MARKETS, NSW, 2129 Tel: +61 2 8762 7777 , Fax: +61 2 9763 2466 , Email: info@efanational.com.

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