Protected Areas in Andorra: Law and UNESCO

Andorra’s protected landscape is described through several systems that do not mean the same thing. National law defines natural parks, natural reserves and natural monuments. UNESCO recognises the Madriu-Perafita-Claror Valley as a World Heritage cultural landscape and Ordino as a biosphere reserve. The Ramsar Convention lists three wetlands of international importance. These labels overlap on the map, but they are not interchangeable: one is a domestic legal category, another recognises international heritage or conservation value, and another concerns wetlands.

That distinction is especially important in September 2026. Andorra’s Government has approved a bill for the country’s first national natural park, in the valleys of Canillo and Ordino, and sent it into parliamentary processing. The proposed park is not yet an enacted designation. Meanwhile, the established natural parks of Sorteny and the Comapedrosa valleys, and the protected cultural landscape of Madriu-Perafita-Claror, already have their own histories, authorities and management arrangements. Understanding who created each designation—and what it protects—gives a clearer picture than treating every international badge as another park.

What Andorran law means by a protected natural area

Law 7/2019 on the conservation of the natural environment, biodiversity and landscape defines protected natural areas as parts of Andorra containing representative, singular, fragile or specially significant natural systems or features, declared under that law. The purposes extend beyond keeping development away from a scenic view. The law identifies conservation of species and habitats, scientific and educational value, landscape, recreation, climate mitigation and natural-risk reduction. It also recognises the preservation of landscapes shaped by traditional rural activity and the contribution protected areas can make to sustainable local development.^S001

Article 20 sets out three domestic categories: natural parks, natural reserves and natural monuments. The categories describe legal instruments created under Andorran law; the number of international designations is not a count of these areas. A wetland listed by Ramsar, for example, does not automatically become a natural reserve under Article 22. Nor does a UNESCO title itself create one of the three domestic categories. To determine the local legal regime, the designation instrument, boundary, applicable management plan and rules have to be considered together.^S001^S002

Natural parks are the broadest category in the statute. They are described as extensive areas that have undergone limited human transformation, where protection is intended to conserve ecosystems, plant and animal species, landscape and geological features, as well as associated traditional uses. Recreation, education, tourism and science may take place when compatible with conservation. The law divides parks into national and communal forms, and the distinction is institutional as much as geographic.^S001

A national natural park must span the territory of at least two parishes. It is created by a law, after the prior agreement of the affected comuns—the parish administrations—and a report from the National Commission for the Environment, Biodiversity and Landscape (CENBA) supporting national interest. Management is shared between the Government and the relevant comuns. A communal natural park lies within one parish, is established through a communal ordinance after the CENBA report, and is managed by the relevant comú, subject to the Government’s legal powers.^S001

This arrangement reflects Andorra’s territorial structure. The state can set national environmental law, while the parish administrations own or administer substantial areas of land and have direct responsibilities for local planning and services. The law’s park categories therefore answer two questions at once: what sort of conservation area is being created, and which level of government is responsible for establishing and managing it. In a cross-parish proposal, the need for agreement is not a procedural footnote; it is part of how the domestic category is constituted.

Natural reserves have a narrower emphasis. The law describes them as less extensive than parks and intended for places of significant scientific value where habitats, ecosystems, species, populations or geological features merit particular attention because of rarity, fragility, representativeness or importance. It distinguishes integral reserves, where human intervention unrelated to scientific purposes is incompatible with conservation, from partial reserves, where scientific or educational work may be possible and traditional uses can continue when they are necessary to preserve the protected values. Reserves are created by law, with prior agreement from the affected comuns and a CENBA report; the Government and those comuns share management.^S001

Natural monuments address a different scale. They are smaller areas protecting a natural feature whose singularity, rarity or beauty gives it scientific, cultural or aesthetic value. They are created by regulation with the prior agreement of the relevant comú and a CENBA report. The law also connects monument status to parish land-use planning and inclusion in the national heritage catalogue. In practice, this category is suited to a discrete feature rather than the extensive valley systems associated with parks.^S001

Andorran law also allows protected areas to cross national borders through international agreements, subject to a prior CENBA report. This provision matters in a mountain range where watersheds, habitats and species do not stop at a frontier. It is an enabling legal route, however, not evidence that any particular transboundary protected area has been established. A cross-border proposal would need its own agreement and formal status.^S001

Three established landscapes, three different histories

The core established natural and landscape sites illustrate why the word “protected” needs context. Sorteny is a communal natural park in Ordino. The Comapedrosa valleys form a communal natural park in La Massana. Madriu-Perafita-Claror is a protected cultural landscape whose international recognition comes from the World Heritage Convention. Their names are often presented together in travel or conservation material, but their founding instruments, managing bodies and principal stories are not identical.^S003^S004^S005

Sorteny: a parish park with a living mountain landscape

The Sorteny Valley Natural Park was created in 1999 by the Comú d’Ordino. Its official material describes a high-mountain landscape of roughly 1,080 hectares, with forests, alpine meadows, wetlands, streams and glacial lakes. Ordino’s park authority manages it as a communal protected area. This local origin fits the 2019 law’s communal-park model: a park within one parish established and managed by its comú, under the wider framework of national law.^S003^S006

The park’s significance is not limited to a collection of rare plants or attractive lakes. The management challenge is to conserve ecological processes in a landscape still used by people. The valley includes pasture and other traditional land uses, while trails and visitor facilities bring recreation into a relatively compact alpine environment. Water features connect slopes, wetlands, streams and lakes; plants and animals depend on more than the individually photographed viewpoint. Those relationships help explain why a park designation needs planning and ongoing management rather than functioning as a label on a map.^S003

Sorteny also sits within the Ordino Biosphere Reserve, designated by UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere Programme in 2020. Local biosphere-reserve material identifies the natural park as its core area and describes wider buffer and transition zones across the parish. UNESCO’s designation covers a broader inhabited landscape than the park alone. The overlap is purposeful: the biosphere framework is designed to relate conservation to sustainable development and learning across a territory, while the park remains a domestic protected-area instrument with its own boundary and management.^S007^S008

Comapedrosa: communal governance in La Massana

The Comapedrosa communal natural park lies in the parish of La Massana. The communal ordinance establishing it dates to 18 December 2003; the protected area was subsequently expanded, and official material places it at about 1,540 hectares. Its landscape includes the high valleys and mountain environment around Comapedrosa, Andorra’s highest summit. The Comú de la Massana is responsible for park management, with its environmental department providing the local administrative connection.^S004^S009

As at Sorteny, the communal form puts the parish authority in a direct management role. That does not mean the park operates outside national law. It exists within a legal system in which the Government retains its statutory competencies, species and habitat rules apply, and other national or international instruments may also affect the territory. The local authority’s role is especially visible in the way conservation, land use and public access have to be reconciled in a working mountain landscape.

Ramsar’s site material records the Comapedrosa wetlands as a 1,543-hectare site containing 74 high-mountain wetlands, including streams, springs, small glacial lakes and peatlands. It notes their role in supporting biodiversity and storing water in the Alpine biogeographic region, and describes the relationship between the headwaters and water supply for La Massana. The Ramsar boundary and the communal park are closely connected, but the treaty listing has its own wetland purpose and site description. It should not be counted as another park on top of Comapedrosa.^S010

Madriu-Perafita-Claror: a cultural landscape, not a national natural park

The Madriu-Perafita-Claror Valley was inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List in 2004 under cultural criterion (v), which recognises the way communities have used scarce high-mountain resources to create a living environment in relation to the landscape. UNESCO describes the property as 4,247 hectares, a little over nine per cent of Andorra, surrounded by a separate 4,092-hectare buffer zone. Four parish administrations—Encamp, Andorra la Vella, Sant Julià de Lòria and Escaldes-Engordany—have land within the property.^S005

The valley’s heritage is material as well as scenic. UNESCO identifies high pastures and wooded slopes, a network of partly paved paths, agricultural centres, fields, low stone walls, shepherds’ huts, stables and the remains of iron-working activity including the Catalan forge. These features tell a story of access, seasonal use and resource management. The cultural value depends on the relationships among them: buildings and paths make sense as parts of a working landscape, not isolated monuments.^S005

Madriu is protected in Andorra through the cultural-heritage framework, including Law 9/2003, and was listed nationally as a property of cultural interest in the cultural-landscape category in 2005. The four local administrations concerned with the valley prepared a management plan, validated by the Government, which entered into force on 28 December 2011. UNESCO says that the plan addresses the cultural landscape, biodiversity, fauna and flora, sustainable activities and access strategy. This governance reflects the valley’s cultural and communal character; it is not simply the shared-management model for a national natural park under Law 7/2019.^S005

The distinction does not make Madriu less protected or less ecological. UNESCO’s description explicitly connects cultural value with glacial landforms, biodiversity, pastoral practices and long-standing communal land management. It means that the legal route and the central conservation question differ. A cultural landscape must retain the attributes that express the relationship between people and their environment, including the continuity of certain traditional practices. A natural park under the 2019 law is constituted through a different category and procedure.^S001^S005

UNESCO labels: World Heritage and the biosphere programme

UNESCO is not one single protected-area system. The World Heritage Convention and the Man and the Biosphere Programme have different purposes, selection processes and practical effects. UNESCO’s World Heritage country page lists one inscribed property in Andorra: Madriu-Perafita-Claror Valley, a cultural property inscribed in 2004. The country page also shows one Tentative List entry, which is not an inscription. Tentative listing indicates that a state party intends to consider a property for nomination; it does not confer World Heritage status.^S005^S011

World Heritage status recognises a property’s Outstanding Universal Value under the Convention and brings international monitoring and reporting expectations. The Andorran law that directly protects Madriu as a cultural landscape is domestic heritage law, supported by its declaration and management arrangements. UNESCO recognition and national legal protection reinforce each other, but the international inscription should not be described as the local statute that created the valley’s protections.^S005^S012

The Ordino Biosphere Reserve was designated on 28 October 2020 as Andorra’s first biosphere reserve. UNESCO reports a total area of 82.7 square kilometres. Its account highlights the central eastern Pyrenees setting, forests and traditional agriculture and herding, along with species such as capercaillie, bearded vulture and the Pyrenean rock lizard. Tourism is a major economic driver in the area, making the quality of the natural environment and cultural heritage relevant to local development as well as conservation.^S007

Biosphere reserves are intended to connect biodiversity conservation with sustainable use and research, education and demonstration. Their commonly used zonation distinguishes core areas, buffer areas and transition areas. The designation does not mean that the whole biosphere reserve is a strict no-use reserve, nor does it automatically replace national or communal law. In Ordino, the Sorteny park provides the core conservation area, while the broader parish-scale framework includes places where residents, businesses, agriculture and visitors are part of the landscape. Any practical rule still needs to be traced to the relevant local or national instrument.^S007^S008

The difference between the two UNESCO programmes is useful when a map or brochure shows both labels. World Heritage asks why a particular property matters to humanity and how its outstanding value is protected. The biosphere programme seeks a working relationship among conservation, communities and sustainable development over a wider territory. A place can participate in both frameworks, as Ordino’s reserve includes Sorteny, but the titles do not collapse into one legal boundary or one management body.

Ramsar wetlands: a third international layer

The Ramsar Convention concerns wetlands of international importance. Andorra’s Ramsar country profile lists three sites with a combined area of 6,870 hectares; the Convention entered into force for Andorra on 23 November 2012. The sites are Vall de Madriu-Perafita-Claror, Parc Natural de la Vall de Sorteny and Parc Natural Comunal de les Valls del Comapedrosa. Ramsar’s annotated list provides site-specific areas and descriptions.^S013^S014

The Ramsar figures do not mean that 6,870 hectares should be added to the hectares reported for the three parks and Madriu. They describe designated wetland sites, and those areas substantially coincide with places already protected or recognised through other instruments. Madriu’s Ramsar record lists 4,247 hectares—the same area as the World Heritage property—while the wider UNESCO buffer is a separate area. Comapedrosa’s Ramsar record is about 1,543 hectares, close to the area reported for the communal park. Similarity or overlap should be verified against official maps before calculating totals; summing every badge would double-count land.^S005^S010^S014

Wetland recognition brings a distinct lens to familiar mountain landscapes. Ramsar descriptions include lakes, streams, springs, peatlands and other wet places, rather than treating the entire valley only as a park or heritage property. Those habitats can hold water, support specialised plants and animals and form part of catchments used by people. Ramsar’s description of the Comapedrosa site, for instance, links high-mountain wetlands to biodiversity and water regulation in the headwaters. It does not, by itself, set out every visitor rule or replace the park’s own management plan.^S010

For the Madriu valley, the Ramsar entry describes hundreds of high-mountain wetlands, including the lake at Estany de l’Illa, within the wider cultural landscape. The same ground can therefore carry ecological, hydrological, historical and cultural importance at once. A wetland listing draws attention to water-dependent habitats; the World Heritage inscription explains the human-landscape relationship; Andorran heritage law and the valley’s management plan provide domestic protection and administration. Each instrument contributes a different part of the picture.^S005^S014

How management works across levels

Protected landscapes in Andorra are managed through a combination of national law, parish authority and site-specific instruments. Law 7/2019 establishes categories and procedures for protected natural areas, while communal ordinances create communal parks and define their local framework. At a national park, the statute anticipates shared management between the Government and affected comuns. At Madriu, four administrations work through the cultural-landscape declaration and management plan. UNESCO and Ramsar designations add international commitments and reporting contexts, but do not erase these domestic responsibilities.^S001^S005

The National Commission for the Environment, Biodiversity and Landscape (CENBA) appears in the statutory process as an expert advisory body. Its prior reports are required in the creation of the park, reserve and monument categories set out in Law 7/2019. That requirement helps ensure that a proposal is supported by an assessment of its national or conservation interest. The commission does not substitute for the decision-making authority identified in the law: Parliament, Government or a comú has the relevant formal role depending on the instrument.^S001

Management is more than maintaining a boundary. A plan can identify conservation aims, compatible uses, zones, monitoring, access and responsibilities. In a communal park, the comú is close to land use, visitors and local services. National ministries can coordinate biodiversity policy and implement national legislation. In a cultural landscape such as Madriu, the plan must also consider how a working heritage landscape remains legible and viable. The specific mix differs by site, so a general statement that “UNESCO manages” or “the Government runs” every area would be inaccurate.^S001^S003^S005

The same caution applies to permitted activities. A protected designation does not mean that all human use is banned: the 2019 law expressly includes compatible recreation and traditional uses among the purposes of natural parks. Conversely, a park label does not establish that every activity is unrestricted. Fishing, hunting, livestock grazing, scientific collection, construction, camping, drones, dogs or vehicle access may be governed by different laws, park rules and seasonal measures. The applicable current rule has to be checked with the responsible authority for the exact location and activity.^S001

Maps are essential because one valley may contain nested or adjoining boundaries. A park boundary can differ from a UNESCO property, its buffer zone, a Ramsar wetland site, a biosphere core or a parish planning zone. Each boundary answers a different administrative or conservation question. A point that appears inside one shaded area on a small-scale map may lie outside another designation, and boundary maps can be revised. Land-area totals and claims about overlap should therefore use the specific official map or site instrument, with the date and measurement method stated.^S005^S013

The same care is needed when reading an inventory. A law can define a category without there being a site under that category; a government web page can list the regulations currently available without being a complete cadastral register; and an international database can contain sites that are also protected nationally. The absence of a name from one summary page is not proof that no local protection, planning constraint or species rule applies there. Conversely, a feature described as a “reserve” in ordinary language should not be treated as a statutory natural reserve unless the relevant declaration establishes that legal status.

Dates help distinguish these records. Sorteny’s founding in 1999 and Comapedrosa’s communal ordinance in 2003 pre-date Law 7/2019, so the current national statute should not be read as if it created those parks retrospectively. The 2019 law supplies the framework for categories and procedures, while each site’s establishment history comes from its own instrument. UNESCO inscription dates, Ramsar designation dates and management-plan adoption dates answer still different questions: international recognition, wetland listing and the commencement of a management document are not interchangeable milestones.^S001^S003^S006^S010

For researchers or planners comparing areas, a reproducible account needs a stated unit and source geometry. “Hectares in the park” may refer to the legal perimeter, a Ramsar wetland site, a UNESCO property, or a wider buffer. A percentage of national territory also requires a denominator and a rule for removing overlaps. If the proposed Canillo–Ordino park includes territory already inside another designation, the net increase in unique protected land will be smaller than the simple sum of each published area. No such overlay calculation is made here because a verified common set of official boundary files and measurement rules was not established for this report.^S005^S013^S015

The distinction between a management area and its buffer can affect both conservation and communication. UNESCO lists Madriu’s property and buffer separately, and its management requirements refer to harmonising the heritage protection zone with the buffer. A buffer is not an additional World Heritage property; it is a surrounding area intended to support the protected property. It should therefore be shown separately in a map legend and area table. The same principle applies to core and transition zones in a biosphere reserve: their functions differ, and publishing only one undifferentiated outline can make a layered management arrangement appear more restrictive or more permissive than it is.^S005^S008

The proposed national park in Canillo and Ordino

On 10 September 2026 the Government announced that it had approved a bill to declare the National Natural Park of the Valleys of Canillo and Ordino and begin its processing in the General Council, Andorra’s parliament. The proposed park covers 8,834 hectares. The Government said the project would bring protected land to 30.94 per cent of national territory. Those figures describe the bill and its stated rationale, not an already operative designation.^S015

That status distinction follows directly from the 2019 law. A national natural park crossing two or more parishes is created by law, after the affected comuns agree and CENBA provides its prior report. Government approval of a bill is an important step, but it is not the same as enactment by the General Council. The proposal’s full boundary, operative date, final text, management plan and legal effect should be checked against the final parliamentary record and published law before anyone describes the park as established.^S001^S015

The Government’s announcement describes four proposed zones: moderate use, restricted use, reserve and special use. It says traditional extensive livestock farming, agriculture, hunting and fishing would be recognised, alongside recreational activities compatible with conservation, while new infrastructure or interventions that could irreversibly alter natural values would be excluded. It also proposes a shared governance structure involving a governing board, shared direction, consultative and participation council, and technical secretariat. These are features presented for the bill; the final legislation and subsequent planning documents may refine or change them.^S015

The proposal is a major development because it would use the national rather than communal park category. The existing Sorteny and Comapedrosa parks are communal; the proposed Canillo–Ordino area crosses parish boundaries and requires a national law and shared management. It also overlaps conceptually with places already carrying conservation recognition, including the Ordino Biosphere Reserve and Sorteny. A new national boundary would not make existing UNESCO or Ramsar designations disappear; it would add a domestic legal instrument and potentially coordinate management at a larger scale.^S003^S007^S015

The 30.94 per cent figure should be read as a Government projection attached to the proposed park. The result depends on which areas are counted as protected, the national territory denominator, treatment of overlap and the final boundary. International biodiversity targets and national protected-area statistics can use rules that are not obvious from a headline percentage. A reliable later assessment should cite the adopted law and the Government’s calculation method instead of presenting the bill announcement as a final independently verified national total.^S015

What a visitor can—and cannot—infer

For someone planning a visit, a designation is a clue to a place’s importance and management context, not a complete access guide. It can signal that a landscape supports ecological or cultural values and that activities may be managed. It does not tell you whether a trail is open today, whether a refuge is operating, what a seasonal restriction says or whether an activity needs permission. Those details come from current park information, local ordinances and relevant national rules.^S003^S004

The label can also help frame what to notice. In Sorteny, the park’s high-mountain habitats and the wider Ordino biosphere landscape make the relationship between a protected core and a lived parish visible. At Comapedrosa, the communal-park and Ramsar layers focus attention on both mountain recreation and wetland headwaters. In Madriu, the World Heritage cultural-landscape designation directs attention to paths, pasture systems, settlement traces and the continuity of communal management. These are interpretive starting points, not a claim that every visitor will experience the same route or every feature will be accessible on a given day.^S003^S005^S010

Respect for a protected site begins with following the rule that applies there, rather than assuming that a familiar activity is allowed everywhere. Stay on authorised paths when required, avoid disturbing wildlife, take waste out, and use official directions for seasonal access. Where the rule is unclear, ask the responsible park or parish authority. Research permits and conservation restrictions are not substitutes for public visitor guidance; equally, a general visitor page may not describe every activity-specific legal condition.

Reading the map without counting the same land twice

Andorra’s system makes most sense as a set of overlapping layers. At the domestic level, Law 7/2019 defines natural parks, reserves and monuments and allocates different creation and management procedures. The two longstanding natural parks named here are communal parks. Madriu has a separate cultural-heritage foundation. Internationally, UNESCO recognises one World Heritage property and one biosphere reserve, while Ramsar lists three wetlands. The proposed national park is a further domestic-law project, pending the parliamentary process as of 24 September 2026.^S001^S005^S007^S013^S015

These layers are not a ranking from weak to strong protection. A World Heritage inscription, biosphere designation and Ramsar listing are designed for different purposes. Nor does a single label tell the full story of the rules on the ground. A place’s effective protection depends on the legal instrument, mapped boundary, planning documents, management capacity and ongoing cooperation among authorities. The overlap can be an advantage when each framework contributes useful expertise, but it can also make public explanations confusing if boundaries and powers are not clearly stated.

For an accurate comparison, ask four questions: what is the exact boundary; what instrument created the designation; which body manages it; and what values or uses does the instrument address? A fifth question—whether a proposed designation has actually become law—matters for the Canillo–Ordino bill. Those questions separate the scenic impression of a protected valley from the institutional detail that determines what protection means.

Andorra’s protected areas are therefore not one uniform system but a compact landscape of parish parks, a multi-parish cultural property, internationally recognised wetlands, a biosphere reserve and a national park proposal moving through legislation. Their shared setting is the Pyrenees; their authorities and purposes differ. Keeping both facts in view makes the map more legible and prevents a designation from promising more—or less—than it actually does.