Territori dell’abbandono. L’Appennino centrale e la campagna incolta = Territories of Abandonment. The Central Apennines and Uncultivated Countryside

According to the data of CREA (Council for Agricultural Research and analysis of the Agrarian Economy) more than one third of the Italian territory is covered in woods, with an acceleration of 5.8% in the last decade. Of the 66,000 hectares that are generated on average per year, only a marginal quota is due to reforestation. Spontaneous reforestation has been seen mostly on plateaus and hills. In Abruzzo, INFC inspections (Inventario nazionale delle foreste e dei serbatoi forestali di carbonio - National Inventory of forests and forest carbon reserves) conducted in 2005 ascertained a forest surface (42%) superior to the national average. The source of this increase phenomenon of natural heritage is the progressive abandonment of traditional activities with a progressive reduction of inhabitants and cultivated fields. Along the hill slopes, processes of selective consolidation, intensification and crop specialization are taking place. The steepest hill sides are marked by uncultivated areas or are the sign of generational passages with little fields but extensive division of the farmland or the progressive coastal-valley extension of the city. ISTAT (National Institute of Statistics) points out that in twenty years (1990-2010) the cultivated soil in the region for productive purposes diminished by more than half (-57%). This contribution intends to agree with the thesis that the complex geography transforming the open spaces today shows variable geometries in the use of the soil and the resources used.