For some days now, the declarations of the president of Federacciai and general manager of Duferco, the iron and steel group that operates in Italy with plants in Brescia, Pallanzeno and Milazzo, have appeared in the national press.
Duferco is controlled by the most important European steel trader, Bruno Bolfo, with headquarters in Lugano and industries scattered from Belgium and throughout Eastern Europe. Antonio Gozzi is, in fact, not only an authoritative protagonist of Italian steel but an industrialist who looks at the sector with a professional eye, with knowledge of the facts and with undisputed experience. Gozzi complains that he had to withdraw his offer (advanced in common with other important steel entrepreneurs) relating to the possible rescue of Lucchini of Piombino after noting only a certain hostility from a local union all aimed at safeguarding an obsolete blast furnace and now at the end of its productive life and Tuscan institutions but also by a kind of fin de non recevoir by the government commissioner.
Today that the plant is being shut down with the employed destined to be included in the layoffs lists and the support measures envisaged for similar situations, it is right to demand a clear answer on the rejection of the Brescian offer from those who preferred to chase after "the butterflies sotto l'arco di Tito” of non-existent or even provocative proposals like those put forward by a phantom Jordanian entrepreneur.
What did the industrialist from Brescia want? First of all safeguarding the continuity of the production of rails (with the Austrian Voest Alpine the only producers in Europe) and of the wire rod of the rolling mills of Piombino and Caleotto of Lecco. Basically 800 direct employees and a good job for related industries.
According to Gozzi, the expectation of keeping the blast furnace lit was not only utopian but a source of further economic damage and perhaps also the pretext for being able to access eventual public investments. According to the Brescian industrialist, the prospect of equipping the company with a less invasive and less polluting electric oven than the moribund Afo had to be considered.
It is also logical to think that in Gozzi's project there was the expectation of consequent and inevitable synergies with the entire Brescian iron and steel industry and its desired corporate reorganization as well as the horizon that could open up on the national one after the hoped-for production and environment of Taranto.
The declaration of the Government and the Region of Tuscany regarding the substantial resources available for the environmental remediation of Piombino (the only reason admitted by Europe for a public intervention) with the addition of the appeal of Pope Francis have so far calmed the spirits of people who lived and grew up around steel for over a century but have certainly not approached a realistic and possible objective of an industrial intervention in the Val di Cornia.
The Commissioner who reports directly to the Government should speed up the recovery of the Gozzi project to give it the feasibility on which to allow the widest possible support.
