Un articolo su ciò che sta cambiando le Alpi Apuane da luogo di distruzione ad ambiente di creatività ed innovazione!

1. KEEPING THE
MOUNTAINS
ALIVEn taly, people are reclaiming the once magnificent Apuan Alps.
hey are trying to put a stop to destructive marble mining, re populate
abandoned villages and to build an alternative economy
From close up, the soaring opencast quarries in
Tuscany’s Apuan Alps look like colossal ice
fortresses on another planet. The backdrop for
a car chase in the James Bond film uantum of
Solace, this landscape is home to the world’s
largest and whitest marble field, formed over
200m years. It is also the site of a long battle,
pitting the marble industry against local people,
who are trying to preserve their mountains for
future generations. For the first time and against
all odds, the locals appear to be winning.
uarries here, especially around the town of
Carrara, have been excavated since oman times.
Their pure marble has inspired artists from
Michelangelo to Henry Moore, and many
illustrious buildings across the world are made
from this precious stone. For centuries, Carrara
white marble brought fame and wealth to the
region. It was part of its DNA, as local people put it.
ver the past four decades, however,
globalisation and technological progress have
turned these mountains into mere mines.
Irreplaceable marble is extracted at frenetic pace
as local marble barons and foreign companies –
including a group owned by the Bin Laden family
– seek to compete on price with producers in
China, ussia and India. The marble is no longer
processed in Carrara, but shipped overseas, where
labour is cheaper, and sold at discount prices to
Saudi Arabia and China, who have developed an
appetite for the stone.
The marble sector is worth around €300m
(£270m) annually, but Carrara is one of Italy’s
poorest cities. The region’s water and air are
polluted by marble dust and mining waste, its
mountains are gutted, causing hydrogeological
instability and devastating floods, and its
ecosystems endangered.
The marble industry’s disastrous
environmental impact on the Apuan Alps has
been known for some time. Yet, a combination of
Italian politics, globalisation, mafia leverage and
the perceived lack of an economic alternative led
to inertia and resignation.
But now, local people, as well as some refugees,
are reclaiming the mountains, trying to gradually
close down quarries and replace them with an
alternative and sustainable economy. Their Save
the Apuan Alps (Salviamo le Alpi Apuane),
movement has helped to nurture a growing
network of farms, local producers, tourism and
art, encouraging young people to return to the
mountains. They are trying to reconnect to a lost
culture and adapt ancient ways to preserve their
heritage and build a better future for local
communities, rather than for a few industrialists
and foreign interests.
They have also organised rallies, conferences,
petitions and flash mobs, attracting national and
international attention to the destruction of the
Apuan Alps. A few months ago, as a result of their
campaigning work, two quarries in a part of the
mountains designated a Unesco geopark were
closed down. It was the very first time that quarries
were closed for environmental reasons in the
region, creating an important precedent.
Their model for an alternative economy, while
safeguarding the local landscape, is attracting
interest from academics and environmental
organisations nationally and globally. But so far,
they are concentrating their efforts in an area of
the Apuan Alps that has few quarries. The next
step will be to try to rein in excavation in Carrara,
where the marble industry is dominant and is
fighting all attempts to slow down or regulate
mining there. Read on: meet the campaigners
66
Words by eronique istiaen Photography by Stefano ommasi
Rec less marble
excavation in
the Apuan Alps
has defaced
entire mountains,
dramatically altering
the landscape

2. Eros Tetti grew up on his
grandfather’s farm in one of the
Garfagnana region’s most beautiful
valleys. Like many young people of
his generation, he left his village at
19, seeking a better life elsewhere,
but “there was always a pull”, and
eventually he returned.
While hiking, he noticed that the
quarries had started to excavate more
and more. “I was afraid that the rest
of the Apuan Alps would become like
Carrara. If you walk in our mountains,
you’ll see that people don’t work and
live there any longer. Tourism and
gastronomy had been a main part of
our economy, but now it’s all gone
because of the quarries.”
In 2009, Tetti founded Save the
Apuan Alps to campaign for the
gradual closure of the quarries, while
developing an alternative economy.
The association now counts more than
12,000 members and has become an
information hub for activists, helping
to promote collaboration at the
regional, national and international
level. More than 100,000 people have
signed its petitions, and videos of the
flashmobs organised by the movement
have been widely shared.
Everyone has always said that
without the quarries, we cannot
survive, but we want to show that we
can. We are looking at our mountains’
lost culture – not in a nostalgic way,
but because in this culture there are
tools – the natural resources, the
values, people’s spirit to address
the challenges we are experiencing.
We’re finding new ways to relate to our
mountains without destroying them.”
Her parents are originally from
England, but Arianna Watson
considers herself an Italian native.
She is part of Odissea, a co-op created
in 2014 by young people to develop
a mountain economy and integrate
immigrants into local communities.
The programme, which is funded by
the Italian government, has so far
provided training for about 100
refugees in local restaurants, farms
and enterprises.
“For those born in the 60s and 70s,
the future was working in paper and
pharmaceutical factories in the
valleys, but many are now closed,
Watson says. We believe that our
future is in coming back to the
mountains, where we are restarting
something old to make something
new. In Tuscany, this feeling is strong:
we have lots of resources chestnuts,
porcini mushrooms, agriculture,
tourism and art – to create a better
future for our communities. Ten years
ago, there was no tourism here; now
it’s growing, but we are still at only
25 per cent of what we could do.
We are the ones who have to
build our future, because we care
passionately about this place and
we can do it.”
Eros Tetti
41, founder of Save the Apuan Alps campaigning group
Arianna Watson
28, member of dissea Cooperativa
Sociale in Gallicano
Alina d’Amelia is originally from ome, but never liked
city life and always dreamed of being a farmer. She went to
university and spent time living in England and in Canada,
before taking a permaculture course back in Italy and
moving to these mountains.
I now live off the products of my farm chicken, corn,
beans and lots of vegetables. I am proud that I can do it on
my own. lder people were at first sceptical, but once you
prove yourself, they give you everything.
She also teaches Italian to asylum seekers and works
as a tour guide in local caves and in Podere Concori winery.
It is a beautiful and unique vineyard it is unusual to grow
vines at this altitude, and the owner follows Austrian
philosopher udolf Steiner’s biodynamic agriculture
approach a holistic way of cultivating, while enhancing
nature and the health of plants.
“My cultural identity is now in these mountains.
Mountains are where nature prevails. There is room for
emptiness here, which gives room to silence, which leaves
room for thinking. I’ve learned more from the silence in
the mountains than from all I had learned before.”
Alina d’Amelia
38, farmer and tour guide at Podere Concori ineyard
Arianna Watson
(pictured above),
and her dissea
friends passionately
believe that there
is a future for local
people that does not
involve destroying
their mountains
There is room for
emptiness here,
which leaves
room for thinking
68 69

3. 71
In the past, chestnut trees, which
grow in abundance on the mountains,
were cultivated and produced food
for the entire region. They were
called ‘bread trees’, because people
made chestnut flour and used it in
all kinds of ways. When people left
the mountains some 40 years ago,
the trees were left unmanaged. As
a result, the area has become more
prone to floods and landslides.
On his 30-hectare patch of land,
Stefano Bresciani has begun to tend
to the chestnut trees again.
With the help of refugees, who he
is training through the government
integration programme and the
Odissea co-op, he is clearing his
chestnut forest, pruning the trees,
cutting wood and collecting and
processing chestnuts.
“It’s a win-win situation: I train
people in an ancient job that people
no longer do and help integrate
refugees. Their energy is important
for society, especially in this area.
They learn things and people can see
that they are doing a good job.
It’s part of managing and reviving
the mountains. Three, four years ago,
there were only old people here and
many villages were abandoned. But
now, young people start to think that
it is possible to come back and make
a future in the mountains. This is
the meaning of my life: to keep the
mountains alive.
Stefano Bresciani
1, chestnut grower,
Alpi de San Antonio
“I was a teacher in a technical college
in the ambia, but had to leave four
years ago because of my political views,
says Yusupha Darboe. “I spent nine
months in Libya, then fled on a boat,
which was rescued by the ed Cross.
A year and a half ago, the Odissea
co-op found him a job in Laboratory
de Transformation, a small co-op that
cleans, grinds, cans and bottles produce
found in the mountains. Because of
the altitude, mountain crops grow at
a different time of the year than those
in the valleys, and some are unique
to the region, such as beans that taste
like figs. These ancient seeds are now
preserved in a regional seed bank.
“We process crops from our own
land, and local people bring us their
produce to process,” says Darboe. “We
make chestnut flour, we clean and bag
beans, corn and farro a whole grain
derived from wheat , and we make
tomato sauce and raspberry jam.
I can operate the mills and all the other
machines. I love it here.
Many refugees live in cities because
they believe there is more work there,
but I like village life. I feel free here.
I’ve built my future in the mountains.
Yusupha Darboe
24, member of the Laboratory de ransformation, Garfagnana
Organisations with a positive story to tell
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