Sudact, videomessaggio di Pasqualino Monti Presidente di Assoporti

First of all, I would like to greet everyone who is participating in this important conference today. I am sorry not to be present; I had to record this video message. Unfortunately, previously scheduled commitments did not allow me to be there. And then a greeting to all the institutions and representatives of the institutions present, to the governor, to the mayor of the city of Reggio Calabria, to all those who are present, and to those who will intervene. The topic is very delicate: we are talking about a reform that our country and the national port system have been waiting for about 10 years, if I am not mistaken. So we are talking about something that can make the national port system much more competitive than it is today. We are experiencing a delicate situation because it is clear that in our country today there is a lack of a national port system idea. We are too often accustomed to thinking of our ports individually, rather than of our country as a set of strategic nodes that can truly deliver extraordinary results when the structures that currently manage the ports, i.e., the port authorities, are put in a position to operate in the market, which is very difficult, but with the right tools.

The reform seems to me to have started from the right point, that of designing our country through Article 29 Fioca Italia, the national strategic plan for ports and logistics. Within this plan, the work done by the government has been truly exceptional in this sense, because a plan has been designed that finally identifies not only the infrastructural deficiencies present in our ports, but also identifies the material deficiencies that are not noticeable. I refer, for example, to inspections, bureaucracy, the fact that our ports and the procedures for unloading goods at our ports are truly too complicated and too burdensome from a bureaucratic point of view. And therefore it focuses very precisely on the infrastructures to be built, but also focuses very precisely on the actions to be taken to simplify customs clearance procedures for goods. It concentrates its attention, always within the plan, not only on the container sector, which is extraordinarily important both in Calabria, so Gioia Tauro for example, how much they contribute to the entire region, it is important for a region and also for our country, but it focuses not only on containers but also on the south, cruises, motorways of the sea activities, solid and liquid bulk, and therefore emphasizes all the activities that take place within the national ports.

After this, we as an association, as the Association of Italian Ports, have repeatedly asked the government to hurry, because alas, the problem of our country today, on the one hand with the widening of the Suez Canal, on the other hand with the democratization processes that have slowed the development actions of North African countries, therefore our direct competitors, today our country faces an extraordinary opportunity but must know how to seize it, must know how to grasp it with the times that are typical of a market that unfortunately does not wait. So from this point of view, I am happy that in Pavia there was a blank check to the government, Minister Delrio, it seems to me with his technical structure, has already presented, is presenting the implementing decree which contains some truly important provisions: on the one hand, simplification procedures for tenders in our ports, on the other hand, building infrastructure with a system perspective, thus making a selection of spending that has been for too many years the weak point of our country. On the other hand, it creates a single window for inspections, thus managing to respond to the needs by removing those 23 annoying stamps that must be placed when clearing goods, and therefore acts to try to create a single administrative counter that is the only interface with those who operate, with terminal operators, with those who operate in our ports. And it takes a snapshot also trying to rationalize the port system, providing for the establishment of the port system authorities, which today and tomorrow will be able to play a decidedly better role than they do today. The port authorities have tools, the presidents will have tools in their hands that are decidedly superior to those they have today, and therefore this will finally be able to give our ports, our ports, from a national system perspective, the opportunity to develop, to respond to market demands. For a long time I have said that ten years is too long for a reform of a system that represents 3% of the gross domestic product in our country. The potential: we Italy have often heard it defined as a quay projected into the Mediterranean. Today, alas, it is everything except a quay projected into the Mediterranean: difficulty in delegating its own funds, difficulty in selecting spending to build the necessary infrastructure, bureaucratic difficulties. It can become a wonderful quay projected into the Mediterranean, but we must equip the port system authorities with those tools that will allow them to achieve what is needed in very rapid times.

So welcome that today we talk about the port system, welcome that we finally manage to make people understand that ports are strategic nodes of our country, that they want to develop and provide the country with additional points of gross domestic product, but they must also do so by trying to combine a need that has become primary, namely that of having connections behind them and being able to develop hinterlands in synergy with the development of the ports themselves. So different modes of transport that must necessarily be able to dialogue. Gioia Tauro is a practical example of how a port, which is the main container transshipment port in our country with about 3 million pieces handled each year, if it had had behind it rail and road connections superior to those that exist today, perhaps it would have developed significantly more traffic. So think of your own home, of those who have extraordinary potential, a wonderful region, and we hope that this reform and the consequent acts will happen quickly, precisely so that these realities can develop, that they can help the country, I said, with additional points of internal product, growth and employment linked to this growth.