ALEXANDRIA – Without milk, or rather without milk from Centrale, the one that stood out in the (many) supermarkets, in the (few) small shops and even beyond the provinces of Alessandria and Asti. Tuesday morning, here, in via Massobrio, is infinitely sad.
“Goodbye, I’m going to take care of the last things” sighs Chiara. And “last things” is not a figure of speech. These are precisely the last matters that need to be sorted out in this somewhat symbolic and somewhat iconic place in Alessandria that produces and sells quality. She’s there too, Chiara Gandiniquality manager for 7 years, al permanent garrison organized by trade unions. Every morning there will be workers here who don’t give up, even though they know that they will have to do so, sooner or later.
Valerio Benedetto he is the one who represents them, facing the CGIL. He rattles off numbers: “48 lose their jobs and to them we must add i 52 sales agents who, being VAT registered, cannot even benefit from social safety nets”. Around him, there are people hugging each other, like they did as kids when they finished school or like their teammates at the championship final.
Chiara Gandini and Carlo Migliassi
Except that school starts again and the championship too. Here, however, nothing. Everything stops, inexorably.
“Going back in memory and thinking back, with today’s hindsight, to some decisions taken – adds Chiara Gandini – we understand that probably there was a very specific strategy“. That is, making Centrale go bankrupt, which has a few shareholders (the Municipality participates with 6%, little compared to the producers and the Cooperative Center…) and 150 farmers who supply the product to Piemonte Latte (in partnership with 18%) who then he is the one who conferred here and who, now, will take care of taking the milk elsewhere, because the cows don’t stop.
Milk (and derivatives) in stock
The latest trucks to arrive this morning are the ones – they explain – that bring the finished products recovered elsewhere and returned here to the cold storage rooms. They will be sold in stock, within a few days, so as not to risk throwing these away too together with the material and moral heritage, “which few people care about”. The bitter consideration comes from that worker who explains: “The city seems disinterested, in Alessandria there is always indifference.”
Valerio Benedetto
Will they be palaces?
Carlo Migliassi, 22 years at the Centrale and 8 at the Cooperative Milk Collection Centre, imagines the future: “What is really valuable here is the land, owned by the farmers. I already imagine that these buildings (which deserve a restyling, ed.) will be demolished and palaces will be built. The same thing happened at the old Cooperative Center. On the other hand, we are in an attractive area, close to the center but a little peripheral and essentially convenient.”
The scenery is beautifully painted. If we look at it with the eyes of a romantic, the colors are dark. Yet until yesterday the milk was white.
this is a test{“acqui-terme”:”Acqui Terme”, “il-piccolo”:”Il Piccolo”, “novi-ligure”:”Novi Ligure”, “ovada”:”Ovada”}
