FARMLAND: 2 MILLION HECTARES ABANDONED. THE GEORGOFILI ACADEMY STUDY: “TECHNICAL AND FINANCIAL-ADMINISTRATIVE RESEARCH APPLIED TO AGRICULTURE IS A NECESSARY SUPPORT TO REVERSE THE TREND”

The evolution of agricultural activity in Italy during the last decade (2000-2010) reveals “worrying decline of both the total cultivated area (less 12%) and the major open field crops (less 22% for grains and less 60% for industrial crops). “The Georgofili Academy study, presented yesterday at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna (Saint Ann High School) in Pisa revealed this data.

According to the Academy, “in many areas of the peninsula abandoning farmland has become an increasingly obvious and worrying phenomenon. In 2010, 2 million hectares were abandoned, of which nearly one million for grains and more than half a million for industrial crops. In particular, in Central Italy there is “the greatest decrease in plantable area and in Tuscany the trend greatly exceeds the National average: Grosseto, Arezzo and Pisa are the provinces where the loss of farmland areas was more than 20%”.
It is in this general framework, concludes the Georgofili Academy, analysis that “research applied to agriculture, both technically and in terms of economics and organization is an absolutely essential support for a timely reversal of this trend”.