The Generalitat de Catalunya plans to incorporate 170 new members to the Rural Agents staff in Ponent until 2030, an expansion with which the corps would go from the current 80 agents to 250 in this region. The announcement was made at the Government delegation in Lleida during the presentation of the Corps' Strategic Plan 2026-2030.
The reinforcement comes at a time of heavy workload in the territory. Last year, Rural Agents carried out 24,600 actions in Ponent and filed 916 complaints for environmental infractions, an activity that exceeds one-sixth of the total 141,000 actions registered in all of Catalonia, despite the fact that the current staff in the area remains small.
The Government plans to triple the staff in Ponent to 250 agents
The director general Elisenda Pérez and the chief inspector Antoni Mur presented a plan that also sets a global growth for the corps in Catalonia. If the forecasts are met, the total staff will increase from 790 to 1,300 members in four years.
Mur explained that the Department is working with a forecast of calling 120 new positions each year throughout Catalonia. Pérez added that 40% of the new positions will be reserved for women, as part of the expansion process planned for the coming years.
The increase in personnel is proposed in a context marked by greater human presence in natural spaces, a higher density of ungulates, a decrease in the number of hunters, and an increase in the risk of fires linked to climate change.
The plan adds a night shift and opens the debate on handguns
The document includes the authorization of a night shift and the equipping of agents with extendable batons. Pérez defended this measure by stating that the Generalitat is aware that the agents need protection and is working so that they can use these defenses.
The possibility of Rural Agents carrying handguns also remains on the table, a historical demand of the corps that gained more strength after the death of two agents in Aspa in 2017.
The reorganization of the service in the territory will also be supported by new facilities. The plan includes four new headquarters and will start with Balaguer, where construction will begin this month so that the facility will be operational in June 2027.
Then will come the headquarters in Sort, planned for mid-2028 although the Generalitat de Catalunya does not yet have a plot, and that of El Pont de Suert, which will come into service at the end of 2031 and already has land assigned. In Lleida, the new regional area facilities are planned for the end of 2034, but the Government does not yet have the land.
Both the Lleida and Balaguer headquarters will have a warehouse, classroom, and tatami for training. The plan also incorporates technological modernization measures, with an artificial intelligence tool already deployed in the Pyrenees to track bears individually through facial recognition with camera trapping and epithelial DNA analysis.
The digitization of the corps includes facial recognition of bears
Mur explained that this system allows each specimen to be identified and tracked individually. The strategic document also adds improvements in the field of remote sensing to reinforce the operational work of the corps.
The first of the new infrastructures will be Balaguer, whose works will begin this month and whose entry into service is planned for June 2027.