EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – A large-scale, three-week-long family entertainment event is taking place in Juarez, Mexico, next month and the Mexican consulate in El Paso is inviting U.S. residents to attend.
The 2025 Expogan 2025 livestock fair begins on Oct. 17 at the Plaza de la Mexicanidad (next to the Big Red X). In addition to animal exhibits, a mini-rodeo and food vendors, organizers have scheduled daily performances by pop, rap and Mexican regional music artists.
Some of the headliners include Conjunto Primavera (Oct. 16), Belinda (Oct. 17), Tigres del Norte (Oct. 24) and Chicos de Barrio (Oct. 29). Admission to the fairgrounds is $5; the cost of each concert vary according to the artist and how far from the stage you will be.
Shows involving dancing horses are scheduled the first week of the fair; women riders in folk regalia perform on the second week; and a bull-riding challenge starts on Oct. 31.
“Expogan-Juarez is a platform to promote the livestock economy on both sides of the border and to foster binational cooperation in that industry,” Mauricio Ibarra Ponce de Leon, Mexican consul general in El Paso, said on Wednesday.
This is the first livestock fair in Juarez in three years and fills a void left by the suspension of the annual Feria Juarez, which usually draws hundreds of thousands of visitors. The City of Juarez called off the event because it lost money last year.
A Tequila festival took place at Plaza de la Mexicanidad earlier this month, drawing an estimated 20,000 visitors over four days.
Organizers and supporters on Wednesday addressed questions about inviting American residents to a livestock show in Mexico at the same time the U.S. government has halted Mexican cattle imports over fears of screwworm contamination.
Chihuahua Cattle Growers Association Juarez President Alfonso Deandar Duarte said all sanitary precautions will be observed at the livestock fair. He emphasized the two recent confirmed screwworm cases in Mexico were reported hundreds of miles away from Juarez – in the states of Veracruz and Nuevo Leon.
“Chihuahua is the number one producer of livestock in Mexico; we’re also number one in (herd) health and genetics (testing) and are free of the screwworm,” Deandar told Border Report.
Chihuahua cattle growers export about 700,000 head of cattle to the United States every year. In 2025, because of the ban in effect since May, those imports have fallen to 35,000 head.
“It has been tough for us this year. We are selling to national consumers, but we have not received the same (profits),” Deandar said. “We are hopeful we can work this out but […] we area selling about half of what we’re used to selling.”
Rolando Flores, dean of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at New Mexico State University, said he believes it is safe for the general public to go to the Juarez Expogan event.
“You have to be careful petting livestock anywhere. Use common sense. Clean the hands of the kids very well after they do that. But it’s a great opportunity for the kids to become familiar with livestock,” Flores said.
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