Chapter 2: Social and Local Development

Title: The new society coming from the Italian remote countryside

Reference: WORLD SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT OUTLOOK 2006 pp. 67 - 73

Abstract/Summary: In Italy there are many rural areas where industrialised agriculture has never become the prevalent method of production. These areas are often remote impassable lands, located in the mountains of Northern-Italy and in the Apennine strip. In these areas, small producers are practising alternative methods of production and trade. In opposition to the policies of CAP, they are searching for new ways to be peasants. To specialisation, they oppose diversification. To intensification, they oppose new systems of agriculture and new practises of breeding. To externalisation of environment, they oppose internalisation. To industrial agriculture, they oppose social agriculture. Their new approach to be farmers is closely connected to global problems: the necessity to defend the environment and biodiversity, the reduction of chains of production and the reclaiming of the right to retail their products. The theoretical approach of farming style can be useful to understand the real innovation of this kind of agriculture.

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