Economy: Sardinia in trouble; manufacturing sector needs boosting
Report by the regional Confindustria Research Centre: despite GDP growth of 1.3 per cent, value added per capita is a quarter of the national average
The value added per inhabitant is just a quarter of the national average, and Sardinia needs manufacturing to grow. It also needs measures to overcome the difficulties caused by its insular status. This is the conclusion drawn from the new report produced by the Confindustria Sardegna Research Centre, entitled ‘Manufacturing to be strengthened: Sardinia’s production gap’.
Turnover down by 10,000 euros
“In 2024, Sardinia’s GDP grew by 1.3 per cent in real terms, compared with 0.7 per cent nationally,” the report states. This is the second-highest regional growth rate after Sicily’s, and estimates for 2025 also place Sardinia at the top of the rankings, albeit with growth rates that remain modest.”
However, these short-term figures do not alter the region’s structural position: Sardinia’s per capita GDP stands at 27,731 euros, almost 10,000 euros less than the Italian average of 37,309 euros. The study also highlights the following fact: Abruzzo and Basilicata have per capita manufacturing output that is more than three times and more than double that of Sardinia, respectively. Even Puglia and Campania, despite having a lower per capita GDP, generate approximately 48 per cent and 64 per cent more manufacturing value added per capita than Sardinia, respectively.
The manufacturing gap
“The gap is much wider in the manufacturing sector. In 2023, the sector generated around 2.33 billion euros of added value in Sardinia, equivalent to just 6.2 per cent of the regional total,” the authors of the study point out, “compared with a national share of 17.2 per cent: manufacturing generates only €1,478 per inhabitant on the island, compared with the Italian average of €5,622.” Hence a hypothesis and a projection. Because if manufacturing ‘had the same share in Sardinia as observed at national level, its value added would reach around 6.5 billion euros’. Compared with the current 2.3 billion, the difference exceeds 4.1 billion, a figure close to 10 per cent of regional GDP.
One year’s growth is not enough
“A single year’s growth is not enough to make up for a deficit that has built up over decades,” points out Andrea Porcu, director of the Confindustria Sardegna Research Centre. “ “The most worrying fact is not only that Sardinian manufacturing is much smaller than that of industrialised regions, but that it is also significantly weaker than in almost the whole of Southern Italy.”
