BIOMASS PRODUCTION AS AN ENERGY SOURCE IN COPPICES OF THE PROVINCE OF FLORENCE, ITALY: CONSIDERING THE ECONOMIC AND EMPLOYMENT ASPECTS

Coppice management of forests in Tuscany, and particularly in the province of Florence, has had a chequered history, which has set the stage for the present problems of forestry policy. In Italy, the period between 1955 and 1975 saw a marked reduction in use of firewood in the home and its virtual elimination from the industrial context, leading to progressive abandonment of coppice management. Since 1975, wood-cutting has once again become an increasingly frequent practice, mainly in beech and deciduous oak forests, to the point that this phenomenon has been defined as a veritable revival of coppice management. This change is due partly to a rise in firewood prices but also to the greater yield obtainable from processing activities, although the observed increase is to be attributed not so much to technological progress (only a few enterprises have adequate equipment), as to the mass accumulated during the period of non-harvesting. Basing our opinion on these considerations we realized a project for assessing the "actual" economic, occupational and environmental potential of coppice management in the province of Florence for biomass production as an energy source. To this end, our work has tried to identify the new potential market area, the enterprises typology, and analyse the social and environmental impact. Moreover, we have evaluated economic efficiency and have taken into consideration the public intervention needed to develop new markets. We have seen that at the moment the possible market areas are tied not only to the traditional markets for house heating by traditional stove with low performance, but also to a new market tied to the most recent developments in heating technologies for dwelling places and small environments, that have allowed considerable technological improvement in heating systems using wood biomasses, which are now more economical and easier to use, have lower gas emission levels and offer greater safety. Another potential market is tied to the electric power production, through the transformation from energy produced by combustion of wood biomass into electric power energy, that we can use in times of peak power consumption in the area studied. The results of this study shows that use of wood biomasses in the energy sector is competitive with oil and gas fired systems, and that biomass production as an energy source is not only environmentally sustainable but also economically feasible and capable of creating job opportunities. Moreover, the possibility for development of two new market areas exists: the first is tied to production of heating energy with new technology plants that use a wood biomass, and result in a high performance; the second is the possibility to develop the electric energy market with the use of gasification or cogeneration plants. In both cases it is possible to create new activities for installation, maintenance and fueling of heating plants, for maintenance and fueling electric generator plants, which will be complementary to harvesting activityResource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Cambiamenti nell’uso del suolo: analisi e comparazione di mappe storiche e recenti. Il caso della Valle dell’Agri, Basilicata, Italia

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The Sustainability of Non-renewable Resources Use at Regional Level: A Case Study on Allocation of Oil Royalties

The aim of this work was to assess the socioeconomic impact derived from the oil royalty allocation on regional development, using a multi-sector model based on a Social Accounting Matrix (SAM), appropriately implemented for Basilicata region (Italy), the typical case of a region lagging behind in a developed economy. Our focus was on how political decisions have influenced the economic development of the region and how a different set of choices can be more effective in transforming public receipts into long-term benefits. Results show clearly that in the past the allocation of oil royalties to the regional Government (as a Whole 990 million euros) generated a much lower impact than expected, in terms of economic growth and employment. Given the structure of the regional economy, much of the impact of investments and running expenses financed by royalties has maybe been lost outside the regional boundaries. A greater effect on income and employment will not be possible unless resources are redirected towards Greater competitiveness of the regional economic system. Better balancing the use of royalties between social expenditure and production investments would probably be the first step towards a strategy of sustainable development of the regional economy

The socioeconomic impact derived from the oil royalty allocation on regional development

The aim of this work was to assess the socioeconomic impact derived from the oil royalty allocation on regional development, using a multi-sector model based on a Social Accounting Matrix (SAM), appropriately implemented for Basilicata region (Italy), the typical case of a region lagging behind in a developed economy. Our focus was on how political decisions have influenced the economic development of the region and how a different set of choices can be more effective in transforming public receipts into long-term benefits. Results clearly show that in the past the allocation of oil royalties to the regional government (as a whole €990 million) generated a much lower impact than expected, in terms of economic growth and employment. Given the structure of the regional economy, much of the impact of investments and running expenses financed by royalties has maybe been lost outside the regional boundaries. A greater effect on income and employment will not be possible unless resources are re-directed towards greater competitiveness of the regional economic system. Better balancing the use of royalties between social expenditure and production investments would probably be the first step towards a strategy of sustainable development of the regional economy

SUB-REGIONAL DISPARITIES: AN INTEGRATED AND DYNAMIC MODEL FOR ASSESSING QUALITY OF LIFE INEQUALITY

Recently, the quality of life (QoL) has become a commonly used concept with a growing significance also in the local development policies. However, there is no sufficient attention to the QoL framework at local level. Thus, starting from the assumption that a reduction in local disparities may also favour an increase in the regional performance compared to other non-regional contexts, we propose an integrate and dynamic model able to monitor QoL components in order to assess sub-regional disparities. The model was applied to the Basilicata region, a lagging rural region of South of Italy. A dashboard of indicators within 10 QoL domains was identified, considering two periods (2001 and 2011), by applying a non-compensatory aggregation method to combine them. Despite an average improvement for most of QoL components in the considered period, the results of the spatial autocorrelation analysis highlighted, in most cases, a clustered distribution, with the tendency of clusters to generate a carry-over effect (both in positive and negative) on the neighbouring municipalities. About 32-33% of municipalities tends to move from moderate to high advantage condition, while municipalities in a risk condition tend to move on to a moderate disadvantage condition. It follows that significantly deficient QoL components, acting synergistically, generate a self- reinforcing process. The proposed model, overcoming some limits related to data availability, allows an integrated knowledge and monitoring of sub-regional inequalities in order to implement target actions to smooth out them

La spesa pubblica ambientale e la sostenibilità del territorio: il caso della Regione Basilicata

Economic growth in Basilicata region has been notable over the past 15 years, and has determinated a notable impacts on environmental. In particular the principal effects were the rising pollution in urban areas and the degradation of natural resource with potential effects on public health. This paper show the evolution of the environmental investments of the Regione Basilicata in triennial period (gen 2003-Dec 2005) by an analisys of environmental indicators (SERIEE). It includes an assessment of the resources resulting by annual programmation documents and economic budgets giving indications about how the Regione Basilicata might better fulfill its mission improving its performance in the environmental

Use of Forest Residues for Building Forest Biomass Supply Chains: Technical and Economic Analysis of the Production Process

(c) there are strong margins for economic profits at the level of each single supply basi

La valutazione del potenziale turistico del Parco Nazionale del Pollino

The development of the tourist sector of a protected area have to be founded upon the tourist potential valuation (PT) of the territory. This valuation is necessary to better calibrate the development projects in relation to the peculiar characteristics of the area. The present research has regarded the application of a framework of valuation based upon an easy transferable model to other territorial contexts. The innovative aspect of the present research is represented from systematic application of the model to test the efficiency of the actions for tourist development in the area of the Pollino’s National Park, and to find the guidelines for the development of the tourist sector

Escaping the resource curse in regional development: A case study on the allocation of oil royalties

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the socio-economic impact of the allocation of royalties from oil extraction on regional development through a case study on the Basilicata region (Italy). We examine how the regional government’s chosen policies have impacted the income of Basilicata residents and the economic development of the region and how a different set of choices may reveal a more effective approach to turning revenue into long-term public benefits. The analysis focuses on growth as well as on distributive impacts of the allocation of royalties. The results clearly show that the past allocation of the royalties accruing to regional government into regional policies generated little impact in terms of economic growth and occupation, the total well below what was expected. Appreciable impacts on incomes and occupation will not be forthcoming unless resources are redirected towards supporting a stronger competitiveness of the regional economic system