Franceschini: Italians need vacations and they will go. Great test of collective maturity

The minister of cultural heritage, Dario Franceschini, spoke yesterday on the program The Words of the Week on Rai Tre, interviewed by journalist Massimo Gramellini on various issues related to the coronavirus crisis. Regarding the restart, the minister promised that “everything possible will be done so that all sectors of culture will restart. Of course there are activities that it is easy to imagine will be able to restart. If I think about the conditions of opening a museum, respecting the requirements on distances, access, no lines, sanitation, it is quite easy to think about it: when we talk about crowded places, and unfortunately most of the events of culture have always been crowded (concerts, theaters, cinemas), it will be necessary to agree with the technical-scientific committee on ways to allow them to open. We will do what we can, but it is difficult now to say, while we do not yet know the progress and timing of the contagion’s return, when it will be possible. One can only say ’we will do everything we can,’ in all possible ways.”

As for the return to normalcy, however, Franceschini says that “we will have to adapt. There will not come a day when suddenly we can return to normal. There will be a long phase that will come up to the safety of people in which we will have to get used to going back to a normality not like before, in which we will have to live with precautionary measures (the distancing, the app that should allow us to have greater security).”

There is then room to reason about the continuation of online practices. Franceschini also hypothesizes the creation of a “Netflix” of Italian culture, to be spread around the world: “in the culture sector we are seeing all possible forms. Then in the meantime there has been a really beautiful thing among the many bad things: the enormous potential that the Web has for the dissemination of cultural content has been fully understood. There has been an explosion of creativity, of online cultural events, of book presentations and concerts, of virtual visits to museums, so much so that we are reasoning about the creation of an Italian platform that would make it possible to offer Italian culture to the whole world, not as now in a voluntary and free way, but for a fee, a bit like a Netflix of Italian culture: a huge potential that could serve in this emergency phase to offer cultural content in another way (many sites and events are already doing it), but in a structured way. I believe that the online offer of Italian culture will continue even after that, and there will be those who will go to see the premiere of La Scala in the theater and those who, perhaps paying, will want to see it while staying at home.”

As for the reopening of beaches and bathing establishments, the minister says that “even in this case it is difficult to make a certain forecast but the work is so that it is absolutely possible. Even there it will be necessary (I have already asked the technical-scientific committee as minister of tourism) to have in very advance prescriptions to understand how it will be possible to go to the beaches. Of course a deserted beach is easy to say yes, in the thankfully crowded beaches of our seas it will be necessary to have distances and safety measures, and they should not be invented by politicians or beach owners. We need scientific indications: there is some time but we have to say it in time because they are entrepreneurs and they have to organize themselves in time.”

On the tourism crisis, Franceschini says that “tourism is 13 percent of GDP, so it’s really a huge industry, probably the most important in the country for all the induced activities, linked then to culture the percentage of GDP grows even more. So you absolutely have to save the industry. All sectors have obviously been affected by this crisis, but the direct impact on tourism from day one is huge, it’s also easy to think that it will take some time before international tourism comes back to Italy, but on the flip side Italians are unlikely to go on vacation this summer around the world, and so we have to work a lot, we are doing it on domestic tourism, on Italian tourism, on proximity tourism. We are working on giving serious incentives in the next decree to businesses that are involved in tourism, to accommodation facilities, and we are also imagining (but I don’t want to make announcements) an incentive that will also help families with medium or low incomes to go on vacation so that it will help them to go to hotels, to beach establishments, around Italy. After all, Italy offers everything the world offers with an even higher level of excellence and beauty. So they will be Italian vacations.”

Then there is the issue of vacations, which according to the minister will take place and, indeed, will be deserved. “I believe,” he said, “that there are booking formulas as they are made and now those who offer them are also incentivizing them with the possibility to cancel I think that this summer there will be vacations, they will be different from the usual, but they will be there. We are working to do it safely, as in all areas, but the vacations will have to be there. Italians also need them: there has been an extraordinary test of our country, then of course, as they say, it makes more noise a tree falling than a forest growing, but facing the fact of staying indoors for such a long time, the fear of contagion, for many families the drama of economic hardship, is really a great test of collective maturity.”

Finally, a final passage on how Europe is handling the crisis: “Europe can do things right or things wrong. We want this crisis to be an opportunity so that Europe is no longer just one of austerity or prohibitions, but is a Europe that helps growth, employment, the creation of new jobs, and right now helps countries get out of the crisis. This is the battle, but for Europe. More pro-European than this there is nothing.”

Franceschini: Italians need vacations and they will go. Great test of collective maturity

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