Svimez: North and South united in the crisis but divided in the restart

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29 July 2021 The Center-North is growing, the Center-South is improving with regions that achieve good results and others that remain in line with the previous year. This is what emerges from the previews of the Svimez 2021 Report "The economy and society of the South".

In the terrible year of Covid, according to Svimez estimates, Italy finds itself united in the crisis, with a relatively homogeneous drop in GDP in 2020 at a territorial level, if compared with the profoundly asymmetrical impact of the previous crisis, but with a

. In the two-year forecast period 2021/2022, the recovery in the Center-North is overall strong and such as to recover what was lost in 2020; with the exception of some regions of the Center, and partly Piedmont itself, which see their distance from Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna and Veneto grow.

The data that emerges with greater clarity is that the three regions of the Center-North (

) which since the beginning of 2000 have gradually separated from the others, as they are more dynamic, should also be interested in two-year period 2021-2022 by a GDP growth higher than that of the entire Center-North and consequently also of the country.

Regional forecasts for 2021 highlight the South

(+ 4.6% and + 4.2% respectively); followed by Puglia (+ 3.5%) and Sardinia (+ 3.2%), and then Basilicata, Molise and Sicily with + 2.8%; finally, Calabria closes (+ 2.1%). Therefore, only the first three regions are at levels above the average expected for the district (+ 3.3%). In the Center there was good growth in Tuscany (+ 5.1%), Lazio (+ 4.6%), Marche (+ 4.4%) and, at the bottom, Umbria (+ 4.0%).

It should be noted that none of these regions, however, exceeds the average value of the Center-North (+ 5.1%), further confirmation of that risk, already reported by Svimez, of the removal of the central regions from the more advanced areas of the country. The regional forecasts for 2022 see a

with a GDP (+ 3.2%) slightly lower (if not substantially in line) with that of 2021 (+ 3.3%). The best performances are still those of Abruzzo and Campania which, despite seeing a decrease in growth compared to the previous year, in 2022 should be respectively + 3.9% and + 3.6%. Puglia and Basilicata would also see GDP growth in 2022 lower than in 2021 (+ 3.0% for Puglia; + 2.4% for Basilicata); all the other southern regions should instead experience greater growth in 2022 than in 2021, in order: Molise (+ 3.4% GDP 2022), Sardinia (+ 3.3%), Calabria and Sicily (+ 3.0%).

Considering the employment forecasts, the Svimez analyzes indicate a trend in growth substantially similar to both the South and the Center-North, settling the change in the South at 1.6% in 2021 and 2.8% in 2022 and in the Center -North at 1.7% in 2021 and 3% in 2022.

Svimez has estimated

at a territorial level

deriving from the main measures adopted by the Government - Budget Law 2021, the two Support decrees and Legislative Decree 59/2020 - including the major investments deriving from the implementation of the NRP in the two-year period 2021-22. According to Svimez forecasts, while the Center-North with the 2021-22 recovery will fully recover the GDP lost in 2020, the South at the end of 2022 will still have about 1.7 points of GDP to recover, which add up to about 10 points lost in the previous crisis 2008-13 and not yet recovered.

of our country is evident if we analyze the dynamics of GDP between 2000 and 2022 estimated by Svimez: the level of GDP in the Center-North in 2022 is, in real values, about 7 points higher than the value of 2000, while it would be in the Noon still almost 8 points lower. Overall, the measures considered lead to quantifiable support in 63% of the overall growth expected in the southern regions in the two years considered; percentage that drops to 39% in those of the Center-North (44% at the national level). The fact that about two thirds of southern GDP growth depends on the expansionary capacity of public policies is a very important issue, especially in relation to the great challenge facing the country in implementing the NRP.