A cheese drying room in the dairy

A way to offer opportunities to young people, counter depopulation and ensure the protection and maintenance of the so-called highlands for the benefit of the entire community.

This is how the Veneto Regional Complement for Rural Development (CSR) 2023-2027 interprets mountain agriculture, to which it has allocated approximately 54.4 million euro. This approach is in continuity with that of the 2014-2022 Rural Development Plan (RDP), which has dedicated as much as 40% of its 1.56 billion euro endowment to farming in these peripheral areas.

Among the companies that have benefited is the Belluno dairy Latteria di Lentiai, which has been in business for over 140 years. In spite of the depopulation that began in the 1960s, the dairy has continued to bet on the future, for example with a new sales outlet. And, by adhering to a call for tenders financed by the Psr, it has been able to purchase equipment for product packaging, a vehicle with a milk collection tank, and a cheese drying cell with a humidity control system.

Another financed project was the one coordinated by the Alto Bellunese Local Action Group for the collection and preservation of seeds of typical plant species in the Agordino area, which now counts 16 municipalities. L'Orto ritrovato, this is the name of the project, has made it possible to set up the Centre for the collection of seeds of native species in the former primary schools of San Tomaso Agordino, to train 'farmer keepers' who reproduce the seeds in their fields and then bring some of them back to the collection centre, and mid-mountain guides to encourage rural tourism.

Again, also thanks to resources from the Rural Development Plan, the Magnifica regola di Villagrande has carried out an important action to combat the spruce bark beetle infestation, a beetle that heavily affected the municipality of Auronzo di Cadore after the disaster caused by storm Vaia in 2018.