Connection as an antidote to depopulation: the role of the NRP in digital innovation

In the folds of Pnrr's numbers there are some that tell of a deeper, invisible Italy. An Italy of villages hanging by a thread, or rather a cable. It is the thread of fibre optics, of fast connections, of digital services. It is a thin wire, but an increasingly decisive one for understanding who stays and who goes.

The map was drawn by Sda Bocconi's Pnrr Lab, which presented a precise and, at times, merciless analysis in Milan during the conference 'Invertire la Rotta - Infrastrutture digitali per fermare lo spopolamento: strategie e analisi per i piccoli comuni' ('Reversing the course - Digital infrastructure to stop depopulation: strategies and analysis for small municipalities'). The event, promoted by Infratel Italia, represented an important moment of confrontation between institutions, experts and operators in the sector on the policies and infrastructures needed to counter demographic decline in inland areas and small municipalities, through the lever of digital innovation.

Leading government representatives took part in the proceedings: Eugenia Roccella, Minister for Family, Natality and Equal Opportunities; Alessio Butti, undersecretary to the Prime Minister's Office with responsibility for innovation; and Wanda Ferro, undersecretary to the Ministry of the Interior. The conference was also attended by Inps President Gabriele Fava and Lombardy Region President Attilio Fontana.

The conclusions of Sda Bocconi's Pnrr Lab are clear: where digitisation is higher, depopulation runs less. Where connection is lacking, people leave. The numbers are clear: between 2014 and 2024, municipalities without 30 megabit per second coverage lost, on average, 2.95% of their population. Those with broadband, much less: -1.12%. A difference worth almost two percentage points. Translated: more fibre, fewer cases.

Yet it is precisely here that the paradox becomes apparent. Because the data also say that NRP funds for digitisation have mostly gone where there was no digitisation. A fact that is, on the surface, fair and rational. Helping those who were left behind. But in practice it has become a boomerang. Smaller municipalities, with fewer staff and less expertise, received proportionally more money than the others. But then they simply cannot spend it.