ROME (ITALPRESS) – On Nov. 16 and 17, Italian Pro Loco associations will meet for an assembly in Rome. “We have almost 40 guests, but above all more than 1,200 participants, the fundamental theme starts from our governance, there will be the renewal of the offices and very relevant issues on the activity of our management will be discussed: third sector, the issue of VAT, tourism, cultural activities. It will also be an opportunity to present our project that is engaging everyone at the moment: the census of intangible cultural heritage, the first of its kind in the world,” explains Antonio La Spina, national president of Unpli, Unione Nazionale Pro Loco d’Italia, interviewed by Claudio Brachino for the Italpress Economy column. “In recent years we have built so much, we have grown by more than 500 localities, we have reached more than one and a half million members and volunteers. We have increased the initiatives, we are investing for the future, and we are following together with the Ministry of Culture and Anci the project of the census of intangible cultural heritage,” La Spina explained, recalling that “the Pro Loco is the point of reference for the communities, regarding both the aspect of promotion, enhancement and protection of cultural activities, and all the animation that is done. Our 6,360 Pro Locos operate broadly on so many aspects and work alongside the administrations. It’s a very strong synergy, we do subsidiarity with the administrations, mainly the municipalities, from the point of view of tourism, reception and from the social point of view because then we put the communities together. “There is increasing talk of overtourism. For the Unpli president, “tourism has to be managed. We cannot aim, from the media point of view only at the big cities, Rome, Florence and Venice, but we need to interact, for example with tour operators, to try to work with the territory and we are the best interlocutor to give that space to the territories, to the villages,” he added. “The main role we have in the small towns, where we carry out 110 thousand events every year that attract 88 million visitors, of these almost 20 million are foreign tourists. We must try to find ways to make people understand that we should not focus only on the big centers, this can help against overtourism and bring benefits to the centers that are less followed on the media level. “Pro Loco can also have an important role against the depopulation of small towns: “One must incentivize and motivate residents to think that that place can become a tourist destination, this means investing in themselves and giving the opportunity to young people to find stable employment in the place where they were born. Then you have to start a system of exchange between small municipalities, activating a number of essential services. Our volunteers do an extraordinary job on this,” concluded the Unpli president, “without their presence many centers would be depopulated, with this activity a community is made alive.
– Italpress Photo –
(ITALPRESS).
