Cohesion is a moral duty, said Prime Minister Mario Draghi as he took office. But it is also no small factor of production, as well as a guarantee of sustainability. A report by Symbola, Intesa Sanpaolo and Unioncamere, entitled “Cohesion is Competition. New geographies of the production of value in Italy”, reveals precisely this: cohesive companies export more (58% against 39% of non-cohesive companies); they make more eco-investments (39% against 19% of non-cohesive companies); they invest more to improve products and services (58% against 46% of non-cohesive); adopt measures related to the Transition Plan 4.0 (28% against 11% of non-cohesive). Also in anticipation, the companies that will invest in energy saving processes and products, water and/or lower environmental impact in the three-year period 2021-23 is always greater in the case of cohesive companies (26% compared to 12%).
Among the cohesive companies, the ability to relate to the world of culture is also significantly greater (through operations such as donations, sponsorships, partnerships with cultural institutions, etc.): the share of companies that declare that they undertake this type of initiative is in fact equal to 26% in the case of cohesive companies, while for companies classified as non-cohesive it is 11%. Another very significant fact is that of digitization: the share of companies that have adopted or are planning to adopt measures related to Transition 4.0 is equal to 28% for cohesive companies, while for non-cohesive companies it is 11%.
The good news is that these companies, although still a minority, are growing: in 2020, cohesive companies evaluated among manufacturing companies with employees between 5 and 499 account for 37%, a share which translated into absolute values is almost 49.000 companies, with an increase compared to the previous report, in which the value stood at 32%. Finally, cohesion also means improving the gender balance: the report shows that important steps have been taken with an increase in the number of women on the boards of listed companies from 170 in 2008, 5,9%, to 811 today, 36,3%, while in the boards of statutory increased from 13,4% in 2012 to 41,6% in 2019, with 475 female mayors.
