Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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1097. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of passports issued in each of the past five years by Horse Sport Ireland; and the number of applications still outstanding from 2024. [29248/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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Horse Sport Ireland have provided the following information on the number of passports issued and the number pending (as of 6 June 2025) for each of the last five years as follows:

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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1098. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the average wait time for a passport from Horse Sport Ireland. [29249/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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Horse Sport Ireland have informed me that there are a number of steps involved in issuing equine passports and that the current average time taken from receipt of an application to a passport issuing is 39 days.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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1099. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of horse passports and registrations dealt with from outside Ireland. [29250/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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I assume that the Deputy is referring to passports and registrations dealt with by Horse Sport Ireland (HSI).

HSI is a recognised breed society and is approved to maintain five breeding books for purebred breeding animals in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2016/1012. The five breeds are the:

- Irish Sport Horse,

- Irish Sport Pony,

- Irish Draught,

- Irish Cob, and

- Irish Part bred Cob.

For each of these breeds, HSI is also approved by the United Kingdom's competent authority under 'The Animal Breeding (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019' to extend their breeding programme to Northern Ireland. HSI has advised me that the number of passports issued for equines in Northern Ireland in 2024 was 777 and to date in 2025 is 56.

HSI currently does not have an extension of geographical territory for their breeding programmes to any other Member State and therefore cannot issue passports for animals born in other jurisdictions.