The largest factory in Ponte Nuovo is called Villaggio del Fanciullo. And the product it puts on the market is solidarity, help to those in difficulty, to those who, in a certain phase of life, are ‘last’. The budget indicates revenues of around three million, a sum made up of many solidarity but also of assistance services that the Nuovo Villaggio del Fanciullo Foundation provides (primarily to unaccompanied minors but also to subjects with various dependencies as well as to families in difficulty due to of the flood) and for which she is paid. But an important part of the Foundation’s budget comes from donations and contributions from companies and other entities such as Prosolidar, a philanthropic body established in 2011.
The financing mechanism of the Prosolidar Fund is twofold: on the one hand the “forced” withdrawal of 10 euros from the thirteenth month’s salary of each bank employee, and on the other an equal contribution financed by the banking company. Twenty euros which, multiplied by Italian bank employees, make a treasure of over five million a year into which 800 projects are also poured which are then skimmed and selected. To date, Prosolidar has supported 680 projects for a total value of 34.8 million in 69 countries around the world.
In Ponte Nuovo, the solidarity of Prosolidar will finance with 120 thousand euros an intervention linked to the post-flood emergency such as the care of educational relationships, mental health and the right of children and young people to access extracurricular educational services.
The center opened at the Villaggio del Fanciullo will work on emergency psychology but also on extracurricular educational services such as a summer center at a reduced cost (up to free) for children which is enjoying great success among Ravenna families. “We act behind the scenes – said the president of Prosolidar Giancarlo Durante yesterday when presenting the initiative at the Villaggio del Fanciullo – and we try to intercept the needs of the least of the least, that is, those who are difficult to access charity funds”. The president of the ABI, Antonio Patuelli, present at the initiative, underlined the “industrious and supportive role of the Villaggio del Fanciullo” and applauded both a category contract, such as that of banking, which represents an “advanced prototype of bargaining national collective” and to the function of “social solidarity in transparency” that Prosolidar exercises. Meanwhile, the Villaggio del Fanciullo is growing and has both a bakery and an ice cream parlor under its belt, without forgetting, as underlined by the president Paolo Belletti, a 3-hectare vegetable garden which allows the production and sale of vegetables, as well as giving meaning to human lives in difficulty.
Giorgio Costa
