Veterinary Education
Global overview of veterinary schools: numbers
There are 520 veterinary schools/colleges globally, located in 113 countries.
94.5% of the world’s population live in a country with a veterinary school. That’s 6,588,399,546 out of a total global population of 6,973,738,433.
However, before we become too smug about this, 41.8% (113/194) of the countries in the world do not have a veterinary school.
The majority of these countries are in Oceania and Africa (Table 1). The small countries of the Pacific are particularly deficient in veterinary schools with veterinary schools only being found in Australia and New Zealand.
Table 1: Continents with proportion of their countries that have a veterinary school / college.
| Continents | Countries | Vet college | Percent |
| Africa | 54 | 20 | 37.0% |
| Asia | 44 | 28 | 63.6% |
| Europe | 47 | 38 | 80.9% |
| N. America | 23 | 15 | 65.2% |
| Oceania | 14 | 2 | 14.3% |
| S. America | 12 | 10 | 83.3% |
| Global total | 194 | 113 | 58.2% |
For the countries with at least one veterinary school, there is one school per 13,555,107 people (on average). The median is 6,090,646, indicating that the data is skewed to the right (Fig 1). The maximum number of residents per veterinary school is 91,195,675 for Ethiopia (at least they have a school). The minimum is St Kits with 1,817!
The number of residents per veterinary school is shown in Table 2 and the distribution is shown in Fig. 1.
Table 2: Number of residents per veterinary school for countries with at least one veterinary school.
| Country | Population | Vet college | Pop college |
| Afghanistan | 30,419,928 | 1 | 30,419,928 |
| Albania | 3,002,859 | 1 | 3,002,859 |
| Algeria | 37,367,226 | 4 | 9,341,807 |
| Angola | 18,056,072 | 1 | 18,056,072 |
| Antigua & Barbuda | 89,018 | 1 | 89,018 |
| Argentina | 42,192,494 | 10 | 4,219,249 |
| Armenia | 2,970,495 | 1 | 2,970,495 |
| Australia | 22,015,576 | 6 | 3,669,263 |
| Austria | 8,219,743 | 1 | 8,219,743 |
| Azerbaijan | 9,493,600 | 1 | 9,493,600 |
| Bangladesh | 161,083,804 | 2 | 80,541,902 |
| Belarus | 9,643,566 | 2 | 4,821,783 |
| Belgium | 10,438,353 | 2 | 5,219,177 |
| Bolivia | 10,290,003 | 2 | 5,145,002 |
| Bosnia | 3,879,296 | 1 | 3,879,296 |
| Brazil | 199,321,413 | 53 | 3,760,781 |
| Bulgaria | 7,037,935 | 2 | 3,518,968 |
| Cambodia | 14,952,665 | 1 | 14,952,665 |
| Canada | 34,300,083 | 4 | 8,575,021 |
| Cayman Islands | 52,560 | 1 | 52,560 |
| Chile | 17,067,369 | 7 | 2,438,196 |
| China | 1,343,239,923 | 18 | 74,624,440 |
| Colombia | 45,239,079 | 11 | 4,112,644 |
| Congo (DRC) | 73,599,190 | 1 | 73,599,190 |
| Costa Rica | 4,636,348 | 2 | 2,318,174 |
| Croatia, Republic of | 4,480,043 | 1 | 4,480,043 |
| Cuba | 11,075,244 | 5 | 2,215,049 |
| Czech Republic | 10,177,300 | 1 | 10,177,300 |
| Denmark | 5,543,453 | 1 | 5,543,453 |
| Dominican Republic | 10,088,598 | 7 | 1,441,228 |
| Ecuador | 15,223,680 | 9 | 1,691,520 |
| Egypt | 83,688,164 | 12 | 6,974,014 |
| El Salvador | 6,090,646 | 1 | 6,090,646 |
| Estonia | 1,274,709 | 1 | 1,274,709 |
| Ethiopia | 91,195,675 | 1 | 91,195,675 |
| Finland | 5,262,930 | 1 | 5,262,930 |
| France | 65,630,692 | 4 | 16,407,673 |
| Georgia | 4,570,934 | 1 | 4,570,934 |
| Germany | 81,305,856 | 6 | 13,550,976 |
| Greece | 10,767,827 | 2 | 5,383,914 |
| Grenada | 109,011 | 1 | 109,011 |
| Guatemala | 14,099,032 | 1 | 14,099,032 |
| Guinea Republic | 10,884,958 | 1 | 10,884,958 |
| Hungary | 9,958,453 | 1 | 9,958,453 |
| India | 1,205,073,612 | 29 | 41,554,262 |
| Indonesia | 248,645,008 | 5 | 49,729,002 |
| Iran | 78,868,711 | 10 | 7,886,871 |
| Iraq | 31,129,225 | 2 | 15,564,613 |
| Ireland | 4,722,028 | 1 | 4,722,028 |
| Israel | 7,590,758 | 1 | 7,590,758 |
| Italy | 61,261,254 | 12 | 5,105,105 |
| Japan | 127,368,088 | 16 | 7,960,506 |
| Jordan | 6,508,887 | 1 | 6,508,887 |
| Kazakhstan | 17,522,010 | 3 | 5,840,670 |
| Kenya | 43,013,341 | 1 | 43,013,341 |
| Kyrghyzstan | 5,496,737 | 1 | 5,496,737 |
| Latvia | 2,191,580 | 2 | 1,095,790 |
| Libya | 5,613,380 | 2 | 2,806,690 |
| Lithuania | 3,525,761 | 1 | 3,525,761 |
| Macedonia | 2,082,370 | 1 | 2,082,370 |
| Malaysia | 29,179,952 | 1 | 29,179,952 |
| Mexico | 114,975,406 | 32 | 3,592,981 |
| Moldova, Republic of | 3,656,843 | 1 | 3,656,843 |
| Morocco | 32,309,239 | 1 | 32,309,239 |
| Mozambique | 23,515,934 | 1 | 23,515,934 |
| Myanmar | 54,584,650 | 1 | 54,584,650 |
| Nepal | 29,890,686 | 1 | 29,890,686 |
| Netherlands | 16,730,632 | 1 | 16,730,632 |
| New Zealand | 4,327,944 | 1 | 4,327,944 |
| Nicaragua | 5,727,707 | 1 | 5,727,707 |
| Nigeria | 170,123,740 | 7 | 24,303,391 |
| Norway | 4,707,270 | 1 | 4,707,270 |
| Pakistan | 190,291,129 | 4 | 47,572,782 |
| Panama | 3,510,045 | 1 | 3,510,045 |
| Paraguay | 6,541,591 | 1 | 6,541,591 |
| Peru | 29,549,517 | 8 | 3,693,690 |
| Philippines | 103,775,002 | 16 | 6,485,938 |
| Poland | 38,415,284 | 4 | 9,603,821 |
| Portugal | 10,781,459 | 4 | 2,695,365 |
| Romania | 21,848,504 | 5 | 4,369,701 |
| Russia | 142,517,670 | 33 | 4,318,717 |
| Saudi Arabia | 26,534,504 | 2 | 13,267,252 |
| Senegal | 12,969,606 | 1 | 12,969,606 |
| Serbia | 7,276,604 | 2 | 3,638,302 |
| Slovak Republic | 5,483,088 | 1 | 5,483,088 |
| Slovenia | 1,996,617 | 1 | 1,996,617 |
| Somalia | 10,085,638 | 1 | 10,085,638 |
| South Africa | 48,810,427 | 2 | 24,405,214 |
| South Korea | 48,860,500 | 9 | 5,428,944 |
| Spain | 47,042,984 | 10 | 4,704,298 |
| Sri Lanka | 21,481,334 | 1 | 21,481,334 |
| St Kits & Nevis | 1,817 | 1 | 1,817 |
| Sudan | 34,206,710 | 1 | 34,206,710 |
| Sweden | 9,103,788 | 1 | 9,103,788 |
| Switzerland | 7,925,517 | 2 | 3,962,759 |
| Syria | 22,530,746 | 1 | 22,530,746 |
| Taiwan | 23,234,936 | 4 | 5,808,734 |
| Tajikistan | 7,768,385 | 1 | 7,768,385 |
| Tanzania | 46,912,768 | 1 | 46,912,768 |
| Thailand | 67,091,089 | 6 | 11,181,848 |
| Trinidad and Tobago | 1,226,383 | 1 | 1,226,383 |
| Tunisia | 10,732,900 | 1 | 10,732,900 |
| Turkey | 79,749,461 | 8 | 9,968,683 |
| Turkmenistan | 5,054,828 | 1 | 5,054,828 |
| Uganda | 33,640,833 | 1 | 33,640,833 |
| Ukraine | 44,854,065 | 8 | 5,606,758 |
| United Kingdom | 63,047,162 | 7 | 9,006,737 |
| Uruguay | 3,316,328 | 1 | 3,316,328 |
| USA | 313,847,465 | 28 | 11,208,838 |
| Venezuela | 28,047,938 | 6 | 4,674,656 |
| Vietnam | 91,519,289 | 2 | 45,759,645 |
| Zambia | 13,817,479 | 1 | 13,817,479 |
| Zimbabwe | 12,619,600 | 1 | 12,619,600 |
Figure 1: Distribution of number of residents per veterinary school for countries with at least one veterinary school.
Methods
Original data on veterinary schools were obtained from American Veterinary Medical Association web site (https://www.avma.org/ProfessionalDevelopment/Education/Foreign/Pages/ECFVG-world-colleges-colleges.aspx). Data was transferred into Excel and colleges from USA and Canada added (http://futurevet.net/students/resources/avama-accredited-schools). Population data for each country (current to July 2012) was obtained from CIA World Fact Book (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/). Number of countries of the word and their distribution by continents were obtained from World Atlas (http://www.worldatlas.com/nations.htm). Excel was used to calculate proportions.
Posted by Rick Speare on 17 January 2013