Piedmont, for the sixth consecutive year, is the undisputed king of green flags of Legambiente, followed by Valle D’Aosta and Lombardy. Five green banners assigned to the region. A figure that shows how Alpis is increasingly attentive to sustainability and innovation. Twenty-three were assigned throughout Italy, recording a +15.7% compared to 2023 (there were 19). Green banners whose protagonists are communities, territories, citizens, associations and administrations capable of focusing on sustainability and innovation, giving a new future to mountain places, threatened by the climate crisis and housing depopulation.
Piedmont confirms itself for the sixth consecutive year as the undisputed king of good practices with 5 green flags, followed by Valle D’Aosta and Lombardy, both with 4 flags, by Veneto and Friuli Venezia-Giulia, with three flags each, and then by Trentino, Alto Adige and Liguria, all with one flag.
For the thread conscious tourism the Alta Via dei Monti Liguri, in the Genoese area, and in the nearby Val Borbera, in the Alessandria area, where the Rebels’ Way is being relaunched, a depopulated and beautiful land is being awarded. In Piedmont, tourism also involves building redevelopment. Thus Moncenisio, among the smallest municipalities in Italy, is at the forefront for the recovery and transformation of the Barracks, which together with the “Le terre al Confine” Ecomuseum constitute the potential fulcrum of a rebirth process for the territory. Added to these is the important intervention of the Piedmont Region which with the “Compensation payment for Natura 2000 forest areas” actively contributes to conserving natural ecosystems.
In this “mountain panorama” of good practices, however, we must not lower our guard as the 10 also reminds us black flags 2024 assigned by Legambiente to those entities that in its opinion “are not following the right path by attacking the mountains”. The ten black flags of which 3 in Piedmont and two also in Valle d’Aosta are linked to the ski industry in the era of global warming and those of a transport and road nature. Among the 10 black flags, the one in the Aosta Valley where between Zermatt and Cervinia the bulldozers at work inflicted heavy wounds on the Teodulo glacier to expand the skiable domains for the purposes of competitive competitions. It’s still
on the list is Chiusa Pesio, in the Cuneo area, for the construction of the roller ski track in Valle Pesio and the Province of Turin for the malfunction of the Torre Pellice-Pinerolo-Chivasso railway line. To the municipality of Bardonecchia instead for the failure to contain motorized vehicles which invade mountain paths and roads in summer.
There Valle d’Aosta has four green flags: ranging from the municipality of Champdepraz (Ao) for its path towards achieving the “Zero Waste” objective to the ExEat social cooperative for the reopening of the Alpe Bonze refuge, combining sustainability and social inclusion, also providing professional training opportunities for disabled children. From the municipality of Courmayeur for the establishment of a shuttle service connecting with the valleys to the Paysage à Manger agricultural project, organized by the Semplice Agricola company, for the protection and enhancement of agricultural biodiversity. Two Black Flags: the first for the interval farm road project wanted by the Municipalities of Brusson and Gressoney Saint Jean and the Valle D’Aosta Region, the second for Cervino SpA for the attack on the Teodulo glacier with the Matterhon Cervino Speed Opening project .
For the Liguriaa green flag: to the Alta Via dei Monti Liguri association for the creation and management of the homonymous Alta Via, with a view to deseasonalization and more balanced distribution of tourist flows.
«With the national summit of green flags – declares Giorgio Zampetti, general director of Legambiente – we want to bring to the foreground the many virtuous experiences that come from the Alpine arc, the result of social and cultural change, and from those internal areas of the country that they attract more and more young people ready to change their lives. Today one of the great challenges concerns the repopulation of these areas, rethinking tourism and a way of living increasingly in a sustainable, innovative way, but also of social inclusion. To win this challenge, both in the Alps and in the Apennines, it is essential not to leave mountain communities alone. This is why we ask the Meloni Government to support the mountains with greater allocations and economic incentives to help young people and businesses, working towards the restoration of essential public services which are increasingly lacking here today.”
«Once again – comments Vanda Bonardo, national Alps manager of Legambiente – mountain areas demonstrate that they are anticipating the times of change, also implementing mitigation and adaptation actions to climate change. Having recorded 23 green flags, which are also growing, is proof of this. The stories told, by their nature, define a third way, beyond the two opposite drifts that border the mountain between museumification and the more aggressive one of the tourism industry. Our mountain is not an uncontaminated place, but neither is it a place to be overturned in order to compete at all costs as happened with the Teodulo glacier in Valle d’Aosta.”
