Sommet de l’Élevage 2025: a livestock show without cattle
Sommet de l’Élevage 2025 in Cournon-d’Auvergne drew about 104,000 visitors, with cattle absent because of animal-health restrictions.
7–10 October 2025, Grande Halle d’Auvergne, Cournon-d’Auvergne, France
Sommet de l’Élevage met on 7–10 October 2025 in Cournon-d’Auvergne, drawing about 104,000 visitors in a year when cattle were absent because of animal-health restrictions.
Visitors: about 104,000
What happened at Sommet de l’Élevage 2025
Sommet de l’Élevage took place on 7–10 October 2025 at the Grande Halle d’Auvergne in Cournon-d’Auvergne, central France. According to the venue, the show welcomed about 104,000 visitors. The 2025 edition was unusual: cattle were absent because of animal-health restrictions. Even without its usual cattle programme, the event remained a meeting point for livestock businesses, equipment makers, service providers and other animal-production sectors, which kept the halls busy with trade and discussion.
Livestock shows usually combine animal presentations with trade, knowledge exchange and equipment. In 2025 one of those elements was missing, and that changed why people came and how they used their time. The commercial side, the advisory work and the machinery halls carried on. Sheep and goats stayed a visible part of the programme. The edition became an example of an established exhibition format adapting to disruption, and visitor numbers alone say little about a year when the programme itself changed.
The show is most relevant to breeders, breed organisations, feed businesses, equipment suppliers and service providers working in livestock regions. Machinery suppliers still had good reasons to attend, since animal handling, feed storage and work organisation remain central needs on any livestock farm. Farmers could also get real value from talking to advisers and established suppliers, even when a familiar part of the programme could not go ahead in its usual form.
Sommet de l’Élevage holds a strong position in the French livestock sector, and 2025 showed how the industry kept meeting under difficult conditions. The health restrictions changed the programme, though their effect on trade is hard to put into numbers. What visitors took home was a picture of a sector maintaining relationships, swapping knowledge and doing business while the cattle rings stood empty. That makes the 2025 edition a distinctive one in the show's history.
Highlights
- About 104,000 visitors at the Grande Halle d’Auvergne
- Cattle absent in 2025 because of animal-health restrictions
- Sheep, goats, equipment and services kept the programme going
Agricultural events 2025
