Catalonia and Madrid are growing at a rapid pace, however the number of unemployed continues to travel at very high levels. Lombardy and Emilia Romagna have unemployment rates lower than the European average, but it is necessary to speed up on education, technology and innovation.
With growth rates close to 3% on average per year, Spain's performance stood out on the European scene in the three-year period 2013-2016. At the opposite extreme, the Italian economy, although returning to growth, recorded a weaker trend.
The gap persists if we move to the regional level: the GDP of Catalonia and the Madrid region, which offered the greatest contribution to Spanish growth, increased by an average of 3% per year compared to increases close to 1% in Lombardy and Emilia Romagna, which played the same role for Italy.
The recovery in the Madrid region, centered on the driving force of the capital, was favored by a sustained development of the tertiary sector (in particular trade, tourism and business services), while Catalonia, the most industrialized region of Spain and first for exports, it benefited from a favorable exchange rate, as well as expanding domestic demand.
Lombardy and Emilia Romagna, while proceeding at a slower pace, have experienced a recovery supported, in the former, above all by the dynamics of private consumption; in the second, also by the good performance of foreign demand.
Overall, the growth recorded in the past three years has allowed the GDP of the two Spanish regions to return to pre-crisis levels, while the Italian ones, although not far off, remain below. Beyond the different intensity of the recovery, one wonders whether these areas will continue to drive national growth and whether they will be able to direct it along a lasting and balanced path.
For the Spanish regions, a major obstacle continues to be the situation on the labor market. Although employment increased between 2013 and 2016, both in Catalonia and in the Autonomous Community of Madrid, the number of employed persons is lower than that recorded ten years ago, while the job losses in Lombardy and Emilia Romagna have been substantially compensated.
Similarly, there is a large gap between the Spanish regions, whose unemployment rate stood at 2016% in 15,7, and the Italian ones where the indicator is less than half. Even productivity, a crucial factor for medium-long term growth, seems to play more in favor of Lombardy and Emilia Romagna, where the product per hour worked is higher than that of the Spanish regions even if it has grown less rapidly in recent years.
If competitiveness is taken into consideration, the picture for the Italian regions becomes less positive. Among the various elements that make up the 2016 regional competitiveness index created by the European Commission, Lombardy and Emilia Romagna obtain a lower score than the Spanish regions as regards tertiary education and continuing training, with a particularly marked gap with the region of Madrid.
Even in terms of the endowment and use of new technologies, the Italian regions occupy a more backward position, while the indicators on innovation, substantially in line with those of Catalonia, place Lombardy and Emilia Romagna, respectively, in 97th and 112th position on the 263 European regions considered (Madrid is 28th).
Overall, both in Spain and in Italy the traditionally most dynamic regions have contributed to the exit from the crisis. However, their ability to sustainably consolidate the results achieved continues to be conditioned by structural issues that can only be resolved with targeted and effective policy choices. Among the priorities for the Spanish regions are efficiency gains in the labor market, while for the Italian ones, even the most advanced ones such as Lombardy and Emilia Romagna, innovation and education remain crucial.
SOURCE: prometeia.it
