Economic recovery through the growth of small enterprises
tetto & pareti - June 2005
Professional operators are the yardstick of the construction market, both for demand (clients) and offer (manufacturers), as for trade shows. They attend specialized trade shows in great numbers and with great attention, but their will to be refreshed is not satisfied by the trend towards the organization business rather than towards the attention for professional refreshment. They attend trade shows but not yet as an investment (maybe a unique one) that the visitor himself makes on research.
The latest example for me was in May at SOLAREXPO – the Renewable energies trade show, where visitors exceeded the expectations of the organization and of exhibitors with a presence three times as much as last year. The last opening day not a single brochure remained in the stands.
Concerning a contemporary subject, as energy saving, the interest shown by professional users and design engineers does not require interpretations or explanations: the numbers speak by themselves.
If on one side this growing interest and care for the energy issue is positive, since it comes from the demand, on the other side it is inevitable to underline the lack of political will of public administrations to create projects supporting this field. The only action that cities conceive is traffic limitation of motor vehicles.
Though the interest for energy saving is growing, and concerns the expenses of all citizens, unfortunately the investments (from research to production of materials and technologies) are made only by private entrepreneurs or consumers. In this situation I contemplate also the installer who, believing in it, invests in the research of solutions, products and technologies to use or propose for the advantage of the community.
Unfortunately these investments are mistreated, firstly by most of the design engineers and secondly by public administrations, since the percentage of those that already deliberated in favour of a radical change of behaviours with lower consumption is very low.
In this respect the Autonomous Province of Bolzano, with the CasaClima project, ratified the obligation to build new class A constructions (energy consumption <30kW/mq/year).
Then when this peculiar way to invest in research, which requires working humbly and with passion for one’s job, is not even recognised by tax policies, any "good deed" in this direction is discouraging; only those rare believers who really want it keep making this choice.
It is hard to think that "good will " of individuals, in continuing with investments and production can produce results when the social and economic motor of our country is daily undermined by an simple-minded and masochistic use of strikes (more of a political than of a contract nature) and by the opposition parties that hinder and make our economy fall down. Not to talk of bank holidays, actual working days or holidays. If for this year the experts of ISTAT expect 251 working days (5 less than 2004) and the daily value of Gdp is around 4,170 billion Euros, in 2005 we would have a decrease of national wealth of around 21 billions, equal to 2% of Gdp.
How can we change our course if Italy, as Germany, has 40 holidays per year and weekly working hours are 37,with respect to 38,8 of Spain and 38,2 of England, but more than 36,2 of France and 35,2 of Germany? Actually we have a total average of 10 holiday weeks per year: like Germany, but ahead of 9,9 of England, 9,7 of France, 8,7 of Spain, 5,6 of Netherlands and Denmark, 5,4 of Austria, 5,3 of Portugal or 4,7 of Japan or 3,8 of Americans. (EU data 2002).
These data should bring about a consideration, in our country non-working days due to illness, maternity leave and other leaves are less significant.
