Horatio are getting FIDS penalty for ecology for starter planets which don't and never would require techs.

This means they get a huge -50% yield on some of the best planets in the early game such as Forest, Ocean etc. This penalty never goes away as long as they have ecology, right up until the endgame I'd imagine.

This also helps explain why people find Horatio to have one of the slowest starts, their planets are gimped.

edit:

Added screenshot, considering the Horatio food bonus (+3) you can see the planet gets -4f -4p -2g [have the law that gives +3] -3s: