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Italian prelates plead for government action to help repopulate rural areas
August 27, 2025
» Continue to this story on Chiesa Cattolica Italiana
CWN Editor's Note: 139 Italian cardinals, bishops, and abbots signed an open letter taking aim at a government report that spoke of the “irreversible depopulation” of rural areas. The report also stated that “the population can only grow in some large cities and in specific particularly attractive locations.”
The signatories of the open letter appealed to the Italian government and parliament not to “put oneself at the service of an ‘assisted suicide’” of small communities.
On the contrary, said the signatories, the government should encourage the repopulation of rural areas “with economic incentives and tax reductions, smart working and co-working solutions, agricultural innovation, sustainable tourism, enhancement of cultural and landscape heritage, specific transport plans, recovery of abandoned villages, co-housing, broadband extension, community health services, telemedicine.”
Births in Italy have fallen by over 30% since 2008, and there are now more Italians over 80 than under 10.
The above note supplements, highlights, or corrects details in the original source (link above). About CWN news coverage.
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