Family capitalism, the productive South beating the North

There is a productive South that surpasses, and by no small amount, the Center and North of the country. The medium-sized industrial manufacturing enterprises of the South (from 50 to 449 employees; sales volume of no less than 17 and no more than 370 million euros; autonomous ownership structure attributable to family control) in fact continue to accelerate compared to similar companies located in the rest of Italy. A trend — as emerges fromlatest report “Leaders of change: medium-sized enterprises in the South” produced by the Mediobanca Study Area, the Tagliacarne Study Center and Unioncamere, presented today in Salerno at the Chamber of Commerce – which has been going on for a decade and is confirmed. Even the soaring energy costs and the pandemic crisis – explains a note – have not slowed down the race of these “ambassadors” of southern change who this year expect an increase in their turnover of 8.1% (against 7.2% of other areas of Italy), after the 10% increase achieved in 2021. Thus, almost half expect to exceed pre-Covid levels by 2022. Confirming a dynamism that in ten years, between 2011 and 2020, saw their turnover grow by 35.2% (against 16.7% in other areas of Italy), productivity by +28.3% % (against +20%) and the workforce by +25.6% (against +19.8%).

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The medium-sized southern enterprises represent the industrial locomotive of the territory, fdaughters of a long-standing family capitalism that has been handed down for generations. These are companies that have also highlighted a resilience capacity that is no less than the others present in the rest of the country. what was underlined by the president of Unioncamere Andrea Prete, who added they are ready to take up the challenges of change by increasingly focusing on the frontier 4.0, also leveraging on the Pnrr. But for this, especially in the South, it will be necessary to develop an innovation model based on strong collaboration between companies, universities and local research centres. The entrepreneurial model of medium-sized companies represents an example of a successful capitalist initiative in the Mezzogiorno. It indicates a possible way of developing those territories, if not an alternative at least complementary to the large other-directed industrialization projects. a systematic study of those experiences and success factors is desirable so that they can be shared and put as a common factor, declared Gabriele Barbaresco, director of the Mediobanca Studies Area.