Dear director
The his article published on CheFuturo, a few hours after the spread of Svimez 2015 report on the South, it sounded like a charge for the many stories and testimonies that are followed with the hashtag #thesudsiamonoi.
It was there confirms that a magazine open to listening, like CheFuturo, can make you heard less alone, even if you live in the heart of Earth of Fires where, alongside the atavistic problems of the South, they are added many other difficulties - such as the garbage fires that occur daily for over a decade or like the over six million pieces of waste packaged in bales distributed over approximately 1.5 square kilometers of fertile territory. Because the Unfortunately, this is also the South and we would like to stop talking about it.  

Le testimonials that we read on CheFuturo are often stories of single hits, Of courageous sowing, of one willpower that doesn't give up. By many who have not given way to the defeatism that grips a large part of the South. Yet this positive energy fails to break through, it infects but it doesn't create a system, in the sense of coordinated actions for technological development, the improvement of bureaucracy, innovation in training and research, growth wages, the significant decrease in unemployment, the reduction of social discomfort, in short, of actions that lead to a real improvement in the quality of life of the South of the country.

The interventions with the hashtag #thesudsiamonoi, synthetic but effective, as dry as direct, published on CheFuturo last August, are appeared as many particles of water which, having felt the force of the wind on the surface, they set in motion like awave energy ordinate which propagates towards a shared direction. That wave it is still in motion, and I would like it to become a tool for further action that of opinion, of impact instead of testimony, effective metaphor used last year by Francesco Luccisano in his inaugural speech of Community Festival  of Change by RENA.

The first simple idea that came to mind, to preserve the motion of the wave #thesudsiamonoi and materialize this energy, It is a biannual conference in capitals of Southern Italy, in which to invite the national government, i local representatives, company and trade union confederations, digital champions, investors, with a specific objective: define the intervention priorities together, choose the metrics for measure the change and meet again after six months to discuss the issues actions implemented and results obtained. A common effort, focused on how to converge successful experiences of individuals in collective experiences of innovation.
The President of the Council, at the beginning of August in Rome, launched the idea of drawing up a Master Plan for the SOUTH in the Democratic Party. We want to participate to give our contribution. We who together with many other people and organizations we are experimenting with models, practices, social innovation initiatives, political, cultural, economic, we would like build it together the Southern Master Plan for the good of the entire country.
An effort collective of synthesis, of cohesion, finding a bit of that again propulsive thrust which accelerated the our recent history after years that are certainly darker than the ones we are in crossing.
We could try to get to the semi-annual conference using CheFuturo (the name is already very effective) as a tool for sharing ideas, best practices, public policies, as a network and permanent workshop.

I try to begin, with an enormous effort of synthesis and simplification that perhaps I cannot you will forgive (trying to help me with some quotes and bibliographical references of recent summer readings), suggesting five #notesfortheSouth, five themes for reflection that I would bring as a contribution to the conference.
Some issues, evidently, concern the entire country, but the SOUTH it could represent a case studies exceptional where to measure the effectiveness of investments and public policies. Yes, I actually wrote investments, because certainly we need public resources (and private resources) for some reforms and essential actions without which the flywheel it doesn't start turning.
The five #notesfortheSouth they could become seven or ten, but I think the effort must be to identify few priorities And concentrate resources risking, as in all investments, but trying to involve citizens, institutions, social partners and companies to collaborate and trust. To do this it will perhaps be necessary to try to identify new models of participation, of comparison but, above all, of synergistic action. I'm sure we can do this by comparing ourselves appropriately.

So I try to describe i five #notesfortheSouth which I consider priorities for the relaunch of the South:

#1 University and Research
I'll start with first theme, closest to the working reality that I know best, which is that of a profound reform and reorganization of the University and research. There “magic formula” of innovation, the real and lasting one, the one that makes a country more competitive for decades, it can only pass through universities and research.
The model which perhaps worked better at the beginning of the century, and which it gave to the States United States of America one step further than all the others, it was successfully tested in Laboratories of Bells in Manhattan (as beautifully described in the book The Idea Factory. Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation by Jon Gertner) who represented a true laboratory of contamination of knowledge and techniques. The main lesson of Bells Labs, as Isaacson summarizes, is as follows: “To continuously churn out innovations, the classic is not enough garage or the atelier of the brilliant inventor. These innovations happen when people with different talents, different knowledge, different mentalities, come gathered together if possible in physical proximity, so that they can meet often" (from “Rete Padrona” by F. Rampini). This is the formula magical, which will then be one of the main characteristics of the campuses American universities, where different talents and knowledge work in contiguity and harmony.
So the first theme is that of a profound university reform in the direction of Contamination Labs that it had been proposed, on an experimental basis with a PON tender, in the last government by Alessandro Fusacchia which stated: “have places, open 24 hours a day, where you can meet people engineering students with those of literature, with economists, with archaeologists and can discuss borderline issues between different ones cutting-edge disciplines to try together to solve the problems of our future."
I Contamination Labs, together with a competitive research department at the same level international, with one “training of the innovator who must start as early as six years old, with schools, education and scientific dissemination adequate to stimulate curiosity, with programs at I move with the times and with a more quantitative basic culture than that current.”, with a “path that must then continue with the offer of selection and recruitment rules international researchers and with evaluations that follow the standards international" (as he claims Roberto Cingolani, Director of the Institute of Technology) must represent a decisive investment choice for development.
Someone will object: there aren't the resources to transform all the universities... So let's get started with some pilot experiments in Southern Italy.

#2 Social Cohesion
Growth of the SOUTH is not just a question of investments, economic resources or of waste. As lucidly summarized by Carlo Borgomeo in his “L'equivoco of the SOUTH", “[…] Beyond the interventions mistakes, waste, inability, there was a fundamental mistake: condemning the South to chase the income level of the North, to import models foreign to it culture and traditions and to develop, in fact, a political dimension of addiction". There are many other problems beyond the need for resources, as he writes on CheFuturo Giovanni De Caro: “if had added education, territorial control and efficiency of the administrative machine, that is, those things that cannot be bought but they have to be done", today the South would be different. It's a bit there too Borgomeo's thesis, which adds: “[…] For to break this logic we need to introduce a profound discontinuity, starting from awareness of the nature of the gap. The South is less rich than the North, but the most serious gap is in citizenship rights, in schools, in services social, in the culture of legality. This is where we need to start again convincing themselves that social cohesion is a premise, not an effect of development".
But from where start in a period of negative economic conditions? Let's also try for this theme to choose case studies: for example some difficult neighborhoods of the large metropolitan suburbs of the SOUTH; but let's give ourselves some metrics: let's start from a zero point and measure, a few years later, social cohesion and development in those territories. Political foresight is needed experiments, the time for short-term politics is over.

#3 Extraordinary plan for Tourism
THE data on the unexpressed potential of Italian tourism (OECD 2011) are known to all the main analysts in the sector but also to many citizens who, for some time, have been asking for political intervention to relaunch tourism, considering it one of the strategic assets of our country. Nonetheless we have been stuck on this issue for too long marking a clear failure of tourism promotion policies in the last 40 years.
In addition to the potential in economic terms, we could also count on the educational power for the majority young people from the sites of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Agrigento, Syracuse, Castel del Monte, Matera, Nora, Sibari (just to name a few examples from the SOUTH). Then there they are beaches, historic cities, lakes, hills and mild mountains, so unique to host permanently guru And big of the artistic and cultural panorama international who choose Italy to live.  
I believe it is It is necessary to start investing more systematically in theirs uniqueness, favoring a school education that is more open to contamination with the art, culture and beauty of our country, through guided tours and dedicated school programs, also facilitating the problem of accessibility of some splendid sites that host extraordinary works, such as the example of the Riace Bronzes told by Aldo Pecora effectively on CheFuturo.
It would be there usual complaint if I reported the comparison with the best data - in terms of investments, economic returns, time of use, quality of experiences, etc. – museums or archaeological sites of other nations. However, from citizen of Campania, one piece of data leaves me astounded, albeit from an analysis superficial it would seem obvious. The Royal Palace of Caserta has less than 800,000 visitors/year (sharply decreasing compared to previous years), while the outlet shopping centre “The Palace” (located approximately 2 km from distance) has over 3.5 million visitors/year (and growing rapidly). Of course, the numbers must be read and compared differently, but it is a given we should revolt, if only for a matter of pride for one of the sites most important museums in the world and why it would be a sign of a relaunch, not only tourist, but also cultural, with young people enjoying the gardens of Vanvitelli rather than the artificial spaces of the Outlet!
For years we repeat the usual analysis on the potential and crisis of Italian tourism, but then there are few shares and investments. This theme would also have need a priority position in Master Plan for the SOUTH. We choose three-four actions to relaunch an archaeological site, a museum, a historic villa, a beach, we help the context with targeted financing for Municipalities, Associations, Businesses, Cooperatives that can propose measurable tourism relaunch actions and then, if they work, in the following years let's invest a significant figure of the GDP for an extraordinary plan for tourism in the SOUTH.

#4 Support for Social Innovation
In the last three-four years, our country and the South have also seen the multiplication of social innovation experiments. An energy that was released from below, in almost all cases born spontaneously and without public resources. Sometimes based only on the time resource of individuals or small groups. In other cases, like HUB spa, the first joint-stock company for social innovation – which I helped to create in the heart of the Land of Fires, together with 70 other members, who are trying to contaminate the territory with coworking, 3D printers, augmented reality, support for startups – with resources private companies put together with crowdfunding (over 200,000 euros).
In Italy, the experiences of social and voluntary innovation are multiplying. The energies even in the South they are very precious in the cultural, social, artistic fields, museum, etc. but, as you ask Barbara Imbergamo on CheFare “The important thing seems to be to unleash energy, hopes and ideas which then It is not clear who and how will collect and in what context."
Where are the public policies to support them? How to create a system, build best practices shared and make positive experiences permanent? Barbara Imbergamo yes question: “But we are sure that it really is productive to unleash brains on socially processes and products innovative, leave them alone without support and see what happens? […] That's correct that individual people invest with their own means, accepting all the risk to innovate sectors that – let's face it bluntly – for to keep themselves standing have an absolute need for public funding such as the social and culture?  Assuming that the old model with is "non-repayable" financing no longer feasible or even desirable? […] And if [social innovators] don't succeed, that's fine same because the risk was all theirs and in the meantime a powerful rhetoric has been built that authorizes cutting [public resources].”
The theme of a strategy to channel all this mobilization is fundamental; find the frame, or the “piece missing" of social innovation, as asked Francesco Russo, President of RENA, in his opening speech in Bologna, it is an effort that we must all make together thinking about new models investment, what metrics to recognize and measure it, what tools and public policies are needed to avoid wasting everything started these years.

#5 Startups not just digital
The experience of HUB spa over the last three years with startups, has taught us that, alongside to the ideas of digital businesses, with strong innovative content, great scalability of the project, and an ROI (Return Of Investment) to tempt customers investors, there are many (in the case of HUB spa they have reached beyond 80% of project proposals) ideas from more traditional businesses, with less innovative value but with original ideas to improve the quality of life in SOUTHERN Italy. Ideas in the fields of food, tourism, product or process design, packaging, fashion, craftsmanship etc. In many cases, the projects involved the use of digital technologies to transform the use or production of products and/or more traditional services. The common thread of the proposals was above all the originality of adapting models from other contexts to the territories of SOUTHERN Italy.
What do we say to all these young people? What tools have we put in place? I'm not projects from venture capital, nor from traditional business angels. Maybe different economic devices and policies are needed. For example, review the honor loan – or other business start-up measures – in the age of innovation social and startups; or offer entrepreneurs new elements of challenge to invest in products and best practices whose SROI (Social Return of Investment) for the SOUTH it is the same important of the most famous ROI.
Then there's everything the discussion, which is connected to theme #1, of not only digital startups that they can arise from universities and research centers starting from entrepreneurial ideas on products, technologies, materials, devices, innovative methodologies, which may concern more traditional sectors of industry, bio-medical, of the environment, services, etc. It's true, there are university spinoffs, but there is a lack of incubators (or accelerators) to which researchers can contact to facilitate and support the transformation from prototype to market. Also on this point, we could start case studies in a couple of southern universities and experiment with effective accelerator/incubator or startup lab models to then spread to other realities.

As he writes Antonio Perdichizzi on CheFuturo, “Above all, there is a need to find new allies, to hold on I constantly live the debate, to bring more and more people into the field and increasingly involve the ruling classes, actively becoming part of them, if and when needed.”. A semi-annual conference (if you prefer a summit) can serve to "take the field", to build a "political and cultural project" on innovation, as he hopes Nicola Pirina, to propose solutions, to network to the SOUTH, as he also writes Antonio Prigiobbo in the debate on #thesudsiamonoi.
It will be difficult to build a synthesis event, keep the network together, write the Master Plan together, but if the Prime Minister, and other people of good will, will give us one hand, we are here ready to collaborate. Everyone together for the common good of the country.

I'm convinced me too, like Alex Giordano, which we will not be able to “enjoy of the shade of the oaks"; but I'm just as sure that the results of the Master Plan, in a few decades, after having sown numerous acorns, will be able to give birth to trees and offer shelter for ours children of the SOUTH, for our children of the NORTH and for the many of our children who they are crossing the sea.

Giugliano in Campania, August 2015
(from "CheFuturo", Il Lunario dell'Innovazione) 
Armando Di Nardo
Assistant professor in Hydroinformatics

co-founder HUB spa