In 2012, a thousand companies closed their doors every day in Italy. According to data on the birth and death rate of companies released today by Unioncamere, last year 383.883 companies were born (the lowest value in the last eight years, 7.427 less than in 2011), but another 364.972 were forced to close (+24 thousand units compared to the previous year).
Result: the balance was positive by just 18.911 units. After two consecutive years of recovery, the figure is so close to that of 2009, the worst year since the beginning of the crisis. Also considering the cancellations of companies that have not been operational for more than three years, as at 31 December last year the total stock of existing companies amounted to 6.093.158 units.
The entrepreneurial fabric of the manufacturing industry shrinks further (-6.515 companies) (depressed by the strong contraction of crafts, which closes the year with 20.319 fewer companies), construction (-7.427) and agriculture (-16.791) .
According to the president of Unioncamere, Ferruccio Dardanello, “in recent years, Italian companies have literally worked miracles to stay on the market. Many, even in the absence of real support policies, have even managed to improve their positions and strengthen themselves. But many more didn't make it and, with them, thousands of jobs were lost, not to mention important skills and traditions”.
At the local level, the highest bill of 2012 pays for it the North, which, excluding Lombardy, loses a total of about 6.600 businesses, three quarters of which (just under 5 units) in the North-East alone. Young people under 35, immigrants and women, tourism, commerce and services to businesses and people are the types of entrepreneurs and business sectors which, in 2012, allowed the balance sheet of Italian businesses to remain slightly positive ( +0,3%, against +0,5 in 2011).
“Time is up – continues Dardanello -. Politics will soon have the fate of the country in its hands again and it must know that the first and urgent objective of its agenda must be to put the business, on which work depends, back at the center of political action, reducing both the tax burden fronts in line with the most competitive European economies. The recovery can only come from the market and therefore we need to encourage the creation of new businesses with a high employment and technological content, giving priority to the South, young people, women and social entrepreneurship".
