A library and a community oven, this is how it moves to combat depopulation, in the province of L'Aquila, black shirt due to the loss of inhabitants, the town of Gagliano Aterno, a small town at 650 meters above sea level in the Subequana Valley: in countertrend, in the last three years with its 230 inhabitants twenty were added.
Not just numbers, but life choices, the result of incisive action at a political and scientific level.
"The first thing I did when I was elected - explains the mayor Luca Santilli - was to finance researchers, with the 'Mountain in movement' association and with the scientific and anthropological method we started paths of participation that we call transmission of knowledge".
Then, he says, "we set up the Neo project (New Hospital Experiences) and began to invite young people from all over Italy, offering them a home for six months to train. Thanks to the collaboration between the administration, community and university, the young researcher Raffaele Spadano , of the University of Valle d'Aosta, Montagnein Movimento research group, has been coordinating, since April 2021, a series of projects that aim at concrete, inclusive, ecological and self-determined development of the territory by those who live there".
The twenty young new inhabitants have become Gaglianese in all respects and this for the mayor, taking into account that the town, 30 km from Sulmona and 50 from L'Aquila, now has 250 souls, can only be "something revolutionary".
Among them Giovanni and Casey, he is Roman and she is American.
After a few years of experience in agriculture and baking between the USA and Italy, they landed in Gagliano Aterno and will open the community bakery next summer.
"We arrived here to take part in the project and we became passionate about the stories of the elderly. We began to prepare the typical sweets of the area. Curiosity has become a healthy habit. We have therefore decided to transform this passion into work.
We will reopen the bakery which also served as a place of aggregation and awareness" they explain.
Then there is the story of Rocco and Vincenzo.
They managed the "Simon Tanner" bookshop in Rome, in the San Giovanni district.
They have retired, closed the bookshop and are about to open a space in the town where they can sell and display old books and organize events.
"It's a way - they comment - to put culture into circulation in these small communities. It's our second life".
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