Andorra boosts animal‑health budget 62% to €1.04m

The Andorran government has increased its animal-health surveillance budget for 2026 by 62%, raising the production-animal vigilance allocation from €645,496 in 2025 to €1,043,498. Officials say the extra funds will be used to buy medicines, strengthen disinfection and biosecurity measures, and reinforce active surveillance and early-detection systems against outbreaks such as lumpy skin disease (dermatosis nodularis contagiosa).

As part of a preventative campaign, roughly 70% of Andorra’s cattle herd—mainly the native Brown of Andorra—has already been vaccinated under EU protocols in place since 2009. The government purchased 3,500 doses and plans a spring booster for rearing stock; younger calves receive indirect immunity through maternal milk. “We wanted to get ahead of possible risks… our bovine sector is small but very sensitive, with a breed that must be protected,” Environment, Agriculture and Livestock Minister Guillem Casal said, stressing the preventive rationale and the goal of reaching herd immunity.

Andorra maintains a permanent wildlife and livestock monitoring programme staffed by 20 agents from the Banders corps who patrol for unexplained animal deaths and take samples for laboratory analysis. Authorities report that all tested carcasses so far have shown no signs of contagion. The surveillance programme also includes roughly 120 wildlife captures a year to test for various diseases and assess fauna health.

To control wild boar populations that can act as disease reservoirs, the administration introduced administrative drives (batudes) about eight months ago—before African swine fever (ASF) cases were detected in neighbouring Catalonia. Hunters participate with dogs trained for steep, forested terrain, and the hunting regulation provides compensation for animals lost during operations. “It’s a key tool to control species that can act as reservoirs of disease,” Casal said.

Andorra has no commercial pig farms and pig densities are much lower than in neighbouring areas, but officials maintain intensive monitoring for threats such as ASF. The veterinary department combines sustained surveillance with the boosted budget to keep the cattle herd and wild fauna in optimal sanitary condition. “Investing in animal health is investing in the protection of the territory, the primary sector and food safety,” Casal added.

Banders personnel have also supported cross-border containment efforts. The corps’ director, Ferran Teixidó, described deployments to Catalonia in response to ASF alerts, where Andorran canine teams worked four days in difficult-access ravines and torrents as part of a coordinated operation. He said teams used 300-by-300-metre grid maps and geolocation tracking to log search routes and help confirm whether areas were clear of wild boar. “Our function was to go to ravines, very overgrown areas where boars move well but humans find hard to enter,” Teixidó said, noting the operation concentrated on the initially defined zone around the first 13 positive wild boar and a preventive perimeter of up to 20 kilometres. According to Teixidó, the available information suggests the outbreak in that area has been brought under control.

Authorities emphasize that preventive vaccination, active monitoring by Banders, targeted population control measures and the increased budget together aim to reduce the risk of introduction and spread of animal diseases in Andorra.