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Provincia Di Modena
Modena
Italy

www.provincia.modena.it

Territory

The province of Modena is composed of 47 municipalities: 23 on the lowland, totalling 47.5% of the territory, 10 on the hills (17.2%) and the remaining 14 in the mountainous zones of the Apennines.
The Mountain Communities administratively group together those communities that are prevalently mountainous and divide the territory lengthwise into 3 supra-municipal areas: the Mountain Community of Modena Ovest, with headquarters in the municipality of Montefiorino; the Mountain Community of Frignano, with headquarters in Pavullo and the Mountain Community of Modena Est with headquarters in Zocca.

Political role

The Constitution in force and the current laws give the Province the role of an intermediate Authority between Municipalities and Regional Authorities. This means that the Province looks after the interests and promotes the development of the provincial community. The areas of activity and sectors in which it exercises specific tasks are: agriculture and food, the environment and defence of the land, tourism, civic defence, production activity, hunting and fishing, school buildings, professional training, education and orientation, services for employment, local programming and planning, health and social services, sport and culture, transport and roads, collection and processing of data and administrative technical assistance to local authorities.

Population

The consolidated characteristics of the Modena territory, linked to good living conditions, the quality of the development of the economic-production system and social living, definitely contribute to attracting new inhabitants. Over the decade 1995-2005, the number of residents increased by 56,000 (+9.1%), bringing the total number of inhabitants in the province of Modena to 665,272 at 31 December 2005 (247 inhabitants per km²) with a growth of almost 5,500 residents more than the levels recorded the previous year (+0.8%).

Economy

The economic system is made up of a total of 66,000 businesses, with small and medium size enterprise prevailing. Another element of specificity is represented by the organisation of production into local enterprise systems, such as the internationally renowned industrial districts (metal mechanics, ceramics, bio-medical, textile, agro-food). The municipality with the greatest industrial density is Sassuolo (the ceramics district), with no less than 134 local units (l.u.) per km² (a total of 5,365 units), followed by Vignola (114 l.u./km², 2,732 units in total), Modena (104 l.u./km², almost 20 thousand l.u. in total), Fiorano (72 l.u./km² with a total of almost 2 thousand l.u.) and Carpi (textile and knitwear district) with 62 l.u. per km², giving a total of almost 4,800 l.u. The province’s economic development, confirmed by a constant increase in the number of active businesses, is encouraged by local government activity supporting and promoting entrepreneurialism and by the presence of a close-knit and efficient network of services for its members, such as access to financing, technical and administrative consultancy, selection of personnel, etc. Total added value produced was 18 billion euros in 2003, the equivalent of about 27,000 euros per inhabitant, a figure above the regional and national averages (21,014 euros and 13,551 euros respectively), making Modena one of the richest provinces in Italy. In line with the development of economically more advanced countries, Modena’s economy is undergoing a gradual process of conversion to the tertiary industry: the service sector share of added value has by now reached 54% of total wealth produced (year 2003).
Total disposable income is approximately 10 billion euros, equal to 15,600 euros per inhabitant, one of the highest totals for provinces in Italy and in line with values of the most industrialised European provinces.