21 



BREEDING OF LIVE STOCK IN BELGIUM. 



The publication of the Belgian Department of Agriculture 

 referred to above contains some particulars respecting the 

 assistance afforded directly or indirectly by the Department 

 to horse and cattle breeding in Belgium. 



In regard to horse breeding, it is observed that the provinces 

 of Belgium have for a long time possessed regulations relative 

 to the improvement of the native draught horse, some of which 

 date as far back as the eighteenth century. Attempts were 

 first made about 1840 to establish in the provinces a scheme of 

 regulations, the main principles of which have varied very little. 

 Under the influence of the Socictes d'Elevage, this system has, 

 however, gradually become more uniform, and in 1901 all the 

 provincial councils of the country, without exception, adopted a 

 scheme of regulations drawn up by the Minister of Agriculture 

 with the aid of the Comite Superieur Hippique. 



The provincial regulations have a double aim : (1) to 

 eliminate from breeding the stallions which do not possess 

 the qualities desired to improve the breed to which they belong ; 

 and (2) to encourage, by means of money bounties, the pre- 

 servation of the animals, both male and female, of native 

 breed. 



In the months of October and November each year 

 an examination is made of all the stallions of native breed 

 intended for service in the course of the year. For this pur- 

 pose each province is divided into a certain number of dis- 

 tricts, which the committees of examination visit. It is 

 owing to this selection of the breeding sires, which had been 

 in operation for several years earlier in some provinces, that 

 Belgium is possessed of a breed of high-class draught horses. 



The committees are formed of five members, of whom four 



