Land Reform in Southern Italy

Abstract

In the first place, we must examine the background on which the land reform work is functioning. The ten-year plan, which is being planned and organized by a special government authority known as the Cassa per ii Mezzogiorno, is to involve a sum of about two billion dollars. Almost all of this is to be devoted to irrigation and land transformation, mountain conservation and afforestation, agrarian reform, road construction, and the provision of public water supply. The jurisdiction of the Cassa extends over 112 reclamation districts (comprensori di bonifica), covering 4 million hectares, and 235 mountain basins, covering 4.2 million hectares. At the end of the decade, 2 million hectares will be improved (bonificati) and 1.6 million hectares will be afforested. About 360,000 hectares will be irrigated and over 500,000 hectares in bush crops. It was estimated at the outset that the whole program will increase the agricultural yield of 3.5 million hectares threefold and increase labor consumption from 20 to 40 work days per hectare to 80--120 work days per hectare-i.e. about one million man-units. A more recent statement envisages the employment of 360,000 additional man-units in agriculture. The reclamation districts noted above are associations of proprietors in specific areas, formed in accordance with the law of integral land reclamation of 1933. These associations are responsible for the preparation and execution of plans of regional development, the costs of which are carried partly by a levy on the proprietors, but mainly (over 87 per cent) by the State. Once a district is formed, it is incumbent on all proprietormembers to carry out its prescribed reforms. Such organizations cover a large part of Italy and in 1948 the government decided to concentrate on those that offered the best prospect of speedy completion and substantial returns towards the solution of the country's economic and demographic problem. These selected districts fall into three categories (Fig. 1). The socalled acceleration districts, that are first priority, are those in which only 30 to 50 per cent of the works had been carried out in 1948. They offered the main possibilities of increased production and labor absorption. With the