Riesi As A Festival: Fighting Depopulation In Rural Areas Of Italy Through Cultural Re-Activation
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Riesi is a small town located in the hinterland of Sicily (Italy) and is classified as a Rural Municipality: one urban environment tracked across the country’s Rural Areas – “marginalized” lands that are located far from the Essential Services’ providers and which are dramatically suffering from demographic contraction. Riesi, in particular, is characterized by an increasing depopulation trend, caused by both the collapse of its cultural framework over the recent years and the lack of working opportunities for the young, who therefore choose to emigrate towards other shores in search of new opportunities and stimuli. How can we provide a new horizon to its inhabitants in order to enhance local resilience and build a better future for the city?
With contributions by Margherita Manfra + Giuseppe Grant (Orizzontale), Rita Elvira Adamo + Matteo Blandford (La Rivoluzione Delle Seppie), Gianluca Fiusco, Andrea Paoletti, Nicola Giuliani (Terraforma Festival), Arianna Desideri, Filippo Barbera, Chiara Erhardt and Luca Steinert.
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Regions and cities are where the effects of policies to promote economic growth and social inclusion are felt in day-to-day life. The OECD Regional Outlook 2016 examines the widening productivity gap across regions within countries, and the implications of these trends for the well-being of people living in different places. It discusses how structural policies, public investment and multi-level governance reforms can help boost productivity and address inclusion. Drawing on a survey of OECD countries, the Outlook highlights country practices in regional, urban, and rural development policy that guide public investment. The Special Focus Part II on rural areas looks at different types of rural area and their productivity performance trends, and suggests that countries move towards a “Rural Policy 3.0”. The Policy Forum on Regions and Cities: Implementing Global Agendas includes chapters by many leading global organisations on how regions and cities can be instrumental in achieving the targets of agreements such as the Paris Accord and the Sustainable Development Goals. Individual country profiles provide an overview of regional, urban and rural development policies as well as performance in terms of productivity and well-being among different regions.
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