Feature: Italian drug addicts' facility promotes "positive economy" model

A positive economy is the development model promoted by Italy's San Patrignano, a facility for drug addicts and an example of social enterprise, Antonio Tinelli, coordinator of the Social Committee of San Patrignano, said in a recent interview.

"We are promoters of new economic and financial instruments," Tinelli said. San Patrignano, the largest facility for drug addicts in Europe, welcomes people with serious problems linked to addiction completely free of charge, without requesting any kind of contribution from their families and without state funding.

How is this possible? The 260-hectare area near the town of Rimini, in central Italy, is organized like a village where around 1,300 drug addicts live, study and work in more than 50 life and training sectors such as agro-food, livestock farming, dairy, wine production, textiles, graphic design and carpentry, just to cite a few.

San Patrignano has become an identifiable brand, with many of its products available on the market and often the result of collaborations with prestigious firms, in the design and fashion fields for example.

"The services and products that we create according to a philosophy of self-sufficiency provide for about 50 percent of the requirements of the community," Tinelli went on saying. The remaining funds, he added, come from private donations which, in keeping with the community's articles of association, do not come from the residents or their families.

According to latest balance sheets, in 2013, San Patrignano's services and products accounted for 15 million euros (16 million U.S. dollars), while 16.7 million euros came from donations. The objective is to entirely cover costs through services and products.

In fact, San Patrignano-style social enterprises promote the development model of a "positive economy," or an economy that not only raises awareness and thoughts of the present world but also solutions for the following generations, Tinelli told Xinhua.

In his view, a positive economy offers major opportunities in a globalized and crisis-hit world that has irreversibly transformed the social and economic models of many countries. The only way to respond to unemployment and fewer opportunities for the future is by taking this innovative approach, he highlighted.

Earlier this month, San Patrignano hosted the second edition of the Positive Economy Forum, two days of conferences on key topics related to positive economy such as positive economic models, metrics of social impact, coaching and training of the youths, public utility services, positive brands and financial and social inclusion.

The forum gathered some 50 speakers including French economist Jacques Attali, as well as representatives of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and local government ministers. Endit