Italy completes the resource planning of the React-Eu fund by sending to the European Commission a 934 million euro scheme, about 68% of which is destined for the southern regions. The resources go to SMEs, interventions for water networks, schools, buses , law courts.
The calculation of new resources
The two tranches assigned to Italy amount respectively to € 11.303 billion for 2021 and € 3.084 billion for 2022, with a total budget of € 14.387 billion (66.8% in the South). This is a higher sum (precisely of 934 million) than the prudential estimate on the basis of which Italy had made the initial planning proposal in April 2021. Therefore, the ministry of the South led by Mara Carfagna and the Department for cohesion coordinated by Ferdinando Ferrara have sent to Brussels a definitive program for 2022, including 934 million for completely new interventions and 2.15 billion for interventions that had already been agreed but which had not found coverage in 2021.
The new lines of action concern three areas: sustainable mobility and the water sector; school facilities; interventions in favor of businesses.
Buses and water networks
The first group of interventions includes 175 million for the renewal of the bus fleets (sub-urban and extra-urban) of Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Puglia and Sicily. By favoring methane and hybrid power supplies, the aim is to replace 500 buses, to reduce the consistency of the most polluting fleets from 4,100 to 3,600. On the other hand, the new tranche of resources for the water networks in the South (investments in digitalization and measurement and control tools) amounts to 157 million, which will allow the ranking of the notice addressed to subjects regulated by the sector Authority (Arera) to be scrolled. . The notice had concluded with proposals for 550 million euros compared to the 313 million put up for tender. Further interventions, for the Municipalities that will accept to enter the industrial management and regulation regime of the Arera, may subsequently be covered by resources from the Recovery and Resilience Plan.
The schools
The second area of intervention includes 259 million, of which about 119 million in the South, for school structures. One hundred million go to laboratories with applications on environmental issues in second-cycle schools, especially agricultural institutes and other schools aimed at specializations in the agro-food chain; an additional 159 million are earmarked for the creation of innovative environments based on digital technologies in state kindergartens.