Terni

With a population of 120.00 and extension of  211 km2 , Terni is the second largest city located in the South edge of Umbria, a region famous for its well preserved tourist destinations and landscape and for housing the highest artificial fall (Marmore), at once a piece of hydraulic engineering work created by the Romans and later on part of the 1800s Romantic Grand Tour. Terni’s extensive availability of energy, huge potential and exploitation of Marmore and the River Nera have long served as boost and competitive advantage to the city so as to make its main industries (steel, weapons, chemical, hydro-plants, mechanical) the most strategic and profitable up to late 1800s and prior to WWII. Today Terni retains among one of the largest industrial archaeological assets in Italy and probably one of the most relevant in Europe. Such legacy has been the strength of the future development with its multinational and national corporation shifting to remarkable chemical sites’ innovation programmes such as high-end stainless steel and green plastic. Whilst maintaining a strong industrial identity, in the past 2 decades Terni has been invested by a complex economic transition. Such transition has seen a shift from a model based on heavy industrial poles to an integrated model based on innovation, research, culture, environmental sustainability and quality of life. Today an important role is also played by the University of Perugia with faculties of Medicine, Economics and Engineering based in Terni and located in buildings constructed anew or renovated by the City Council. Terni has also important research labs and centres striving in bio-technologies, nanotechnologies cancer, aero-spatial mechanics. In the course of 2011 the economy of the city showed signs of a persisted and prolonged crisis that affected the territory despite a timid recover registered in 2010. Such negative situation has had a direct impact on SMEs affected by difficulties in paying out pension and security benefits to employees and on the other hand recourse to off the book labour. In the course of the second semester of 2011 the number of enterprises present in Terni territory contracted while exports have increased reaching a total of 9.4%. Among sectors with the best performance are food (+ 11,2%), textile and clothes (+26,1%), wood, paper and printing (+79%). Terni general unemployment rate is 4.5%.  By the end of 2011 companies operating in ICT and related sectors present in the territory totalled 358 representing only a small fraction (1.85%) of the total number of enterprises.