Climate change costs Italy EUR 300 per inhabitant, EU record

At almost €300 per inhabitant (€284), Italy ranks first in Europe for economic losses due to climate change, a figure that has increased fivefold (+490%) since 2015. These data processed by The European House - Ambrosetti emerged at the start of the work of the sixth edition of the Community Valore Acqua per l'Italia, which includes 42 companies and institutions of the extended water supply chain. The situation is also critical in Spain (221 euros of losses per inhabitant) and Hungary (214), while Germany and France remain closer to the European average of 116 euros per citizen. By contrast, economic damage, caused mainly by floods (44% of cases), storms (34%) and heat waves (14%), is almost imperceptible in Greece, Denmark, Lithuania and Poland.

"We are experiencing a particularly delicate situation, especially in our country," explains Valerio De Molli, Managing partner and Ceo of The European House - Ambrosetti, "which this year is estimated to reach the highest temperature anomaly in Italian history, +1.75°C above average, with all the consequences we are well aware of. The correct management of the water resource is and will therefore be an increasingly decisive element,' continues De Molli, 'which we monitor through the Valore Acqua Community and which must certainly be supported by an update of the infrastructures with a view to increasing storage, but also by a rapid process of digitalisation of the extended supply chain and by an increase in the efficiency of data collection and management.

In the Italian regions - there are already 12 regions with high water stress, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily, and Apulia the most exposed - the economic sectors suffering the greatest impact from water scarcity are agriculture and hydroelectricity. In agriculture, as certified by the Community Valore Acqua per l'Italia Teha, between 2023 and 2022, honey production fell by 70%, pear production by 63% and cherry production by 60%. Also suffering are the production of olive oil (-27%), wine (-12%) and tomatoes, down 12%.

'If we fail to reverse the trend and +2° global warming is reached,' stresses Teha partner Benedetta Brioschi, 'the loss of hydropower capacity in Italy would double and triple if 3 degrees more warming is reached in southern Italy and along the Alps.

According to the National Extraordinary Commissioner for Urgent Interventions related to the water shortage phenomenon Nicola Dell'Acqua, in order to improve the water crisis more powers should be given to the basin authorities because "they are the bodies that can help the country govern the drought emergency by entrusting them with the planning of primary water supply and leaving only local management to the regions. The only necessary tool for planning interventions," continued Mr. Dell'Acqua, "is the water budget, which must be drawn up at the district level in a broader vision that overcomes local and regional diatribes: the great hydraulic nodes will deliver water from point A to point B of the country, overcoming regional and district boundaries: we no longer have the time to witness diatribes on the payment of the resource, all the actors in the field must become aware of the heavy impact of fragmented water management on the future of Italy".