The Andorran Family Business (EFA), which held the twentieth edition of the entity’s Forum last Thursday, requested more frequent flights between La Seu-Andorra airport and Madrid. The president of the EFA, Francesc Mora, insisted on the importance of expanding connections with the capital of Spain, as well as with other destinations such as Palma and “with France, the United Kingdom and Portugal”. The EFA Forum was held at the Sport Hotel Village in Soldeu.
The meeting, which aimed to evaluate the first months of operation of the airport infrastructure that connects Andorra with Spain, registered an important consensus with the idea of ??expanding air frequencies. The Air Nostrum line that connects Andorra with Madrid is working perfectly. Juan Corral, commercial director of Air Nostrum, pointed out that the result “is frankly good, with successful figures both in terms of quality, regularity and punctuality.” For his part, the Minister of Tourism and Telecommunications, Jordi Torres, emphasized the importance of “growing in the offer of flights and exploring new routes that are strategic for the country, such as Palma, since every winter we have many skiers who come of the Balearic Islands”.
Along these lines, the president of The Route Hunters company, Javier Suárez, confirmed that the connection with Palma “would be profitable and very interesting for the principality”, as is happening with the connection with Madrid. Air Nostrum, the company in charge of flights from Andorra, has more than 80 destinations in its offer, which places it in a situation of great experience to glimpse the objective of growing with new routes.
The Andorran Family Business Forum also hosted a talk with the directors of the Catalan multinational Grifols, Víctor Grifols Deu and Albert Grifols Coma-Cros. These members of the Catalan pharmaceutical leadership illustrated the audience with the company’s experience and its dedication to key issues such as research, innovation, technology, medicine and science. Grifols has registered exponential growth throughout the world, especially in the United States, and also in Andorra, where an investment of 25 million euros has been budgeted.
The new research center that will be inaugurated in Andorra will have great scientific value at an international level, according to Víctor Grifols. In the presentation by Víctor Grifols, the difficulties that family businesses often suffer in making certain decisions “as happened to us when we decided to go public” were addressed. The Grifols entitled their talk History of a saga of entrepreneurs and highlighted that family businesses must be entrepreneurial and committed to carry out their activity successfully.
The Secretary of State for European Affairs, Landry Riba, also took part in the EFA act, explaining the moment in which the negotiations of the association agreement with the European Union are taking place. In his opinion, “the framework text is agreed on 85% of its content, although not signed.” Regarding the protocols and annexes, which affect 25 sensitive matters for Andorra, such as the free movement of capital, social security or intellectual property, Riba pointed out that political arbitrations or a longer-term negotiation will be needed.
Andorra’s objective, according to Landry Riba, has historically been to participate in the internal market of the European Union. For this reason, he stressed that “the agreement must allow for an instrument to diversify the economy of our country.” The future agreement will also “allow us to influence the rule-making process in Brussels and give us the strength to defend our position at the negotiating table.”
