In July, after the missions to China of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Mimit Minister Adolfo Urso, more will be known about the possibility of Dongfeng Motor investing in Italy. The large manufacturer of battery-powered cars 100 percent controlled by the Chinese state has been in negotiations with the Italian government for some time to verify the conditions of a landing in the Bel Paese. In recent months, an Italian delegation led by Amedeo Teti, general director of Mimit and coordinator of the ministerial table on the crisis in the Brindisi industrial sector, had already met the company’s top management in China. The government would offer subsidies, within the limits imposed by the ban on state aid. The match closely affects the ports of Brindisi and Taranto, which would have been made available by the executive as a logistics hub, as a European outpost for the entry of electric cars. The sudden increase in duties on Chinese cars decided in recent hours by Europe could also have the effect of accelerating the arrival of Dongfeng in Italy. In fact, if Chinese car manufacturers decide to open factories in the Old Continent for car assembly, they could hope to circumvent the duties imposed by Brussels.
This is a great opportunity for the port of Brindisi, which has already been chosen by Grimaldi as a base for the transshipment of cars, transported through the car carriers of the Italian company. Minister Urso confirmed to Corriere della Sera that there is a «willingness to cooperate with China both in trade and for possible mutual investments in electric vehicles in general, but not only. We are open to investments. We have left the Silk Road – he concluded – but we believe in the market road”.
If the Dongfeng discussion is still remote, the one linked to Grimaldi, however, is very concrete. The project involves the occupation of 19 hectares, with a first phase which would see the company use only the quay where Enel currently handles coal and a second phase with an expansion towards the customs free zone of Enel and Cerano. We are talking about an investment of 60 million euros and 240 employees.
After having effectively acquired the management of the port of Igoumenitsa, Grimaldi looks to Brindisi with ever greater interest given the exponential growth of rolling stock traffic along the Motorway of the Sea which reaches Puglia from the east, and then continues its route towards the Tyrrhenian.
And speaking of routes, in recent hours the MIT has issued a note expressing satisfaction with the definitive adoption by the EU Council of the Regulation on Ten-T Networks. The official exclusion has arrived for Brindisi. «The Baltic Sea-Adriatic Sea corridor is enriched, on the Italian side, by the extension of the Adriatic Ridge up to Bari» and «the new Western Balkans corridor connects Italy from the south with the new Bari-Durres-Skopje-Sofia route “, comments the satisfied minister Matteo Salvini, who adds that “the Brindisi-Taranto railway section has been included in the Global Network”. In essence, it means the possibility of strengthening the axis between the two port and industrial cities. Assuming that this may be news welcomed by the Brindisi area, what is certain at the moment is that the infrastructures belonging to the Ten-T Network are eligible for European funding. And Brindisi is out, once again.
