Legambiente

Legambiente is an Italian environmentalist association with roots in the anti-nuclear movement that developed in Italy and throughout the Western world in the second half of the '70s. Founded in 1980 as part of the ARCI, it later became and a stand-alone organisation. Originally known as Lega per l'ambiente (League for the Environment), it changed name during the IV National Congress held in Parma in 1992 to avoid confusion with other movements, especially with the 'Lega' political party.[1]

Activity

In more than thirty years of activity, Legambiente organized environmental monitoring campaigns in Italy (Green Schooner, Green Train, and others) and activities of voluntary (Clean Beaches, Clean Up the World).

Legambiente organized environmental education campaigns, promoted and increased the mobilization against smog and referendums of 1987 and 2011 against the nuclear energy, fought against illegal building and lifted the veil on the illegal dumping of waste and the action of ecomafie, with an annual report on environmental crimes related to the activities of criminal organizations.

The association promotes, among other things, the use of alternative energy and renewable energy, the energy conservation, the preservation of some protected areas, fighting illegal waste management. It annually processes an accurate analysis of the situation of ' environment in Italy with the Ambiente Italia report.

Since 2004 Legambiente organizes Voler Bene all'Italia (i.e. loving Italy), an initiative for the protection and enhancement of the municipalities with less than 5,000 inhabitants, which constitute an important part of the historical and cultural Italian.

The association publishes the monthly La Nuova Ecologia (New Ecology).

The Chernobyl disaster and the mobilization against nuclear power

On 26 April 1986 an accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine released a radioactive cloud across half of Europe. In Italy the first reactions of the authorities tend to downplay the impact of the accident. The magazine La Nuova Ecologia and the Lega per l'Ambinte, in early May, show evidence during a press conference of the data about radiation levels detected in the country. In the following days the authorities forbid the consumption of some foods such as milk and salad. On May 10 in Rome a great popular event attended by more than 200,000 people marks the first step towards a referendum that the following year puts an end to the use of nuclear energy in Italy.

The uprise against nuclear power represents a turning point in the history of environmentalism in Italy: more than one million people sign to ask for the referendum, the Lega per l'ambiente and WWF double their members, and the general election of 1987 the Greens get nearly a million votes.

Legambiente was also one of the promoters of the referendum committee against nuclear power, the coalition "Vote Yes to stop the nuclear", consisting of more than 60 associations, which promoted the mobilization for the referendum on 12 and 13 June 2011. Referendum that confirmed, 25 years after Chernobyl ', the opposition of the majority of the Italian citizens against nuclear energy[2]

Green Schooner

Also in 1986, for the first time the Goletta Verde (Green Schooner) made a voyage from Sanremo to Trieste along the 4,000 kilometers of the Italian coast to check the health of the sea. The campaign, organized together with the magazine L'Espresso (which publishes weekly data from surveys carried out) is the first study on marine pollution at a time when the control authorities were not able to provide an overview of state of the sea. In each location where the boat stops (in the first edition they are 45) press conferences are held to discuss the state of sea's health.

In the following years, partly as a result of the stimulus represented by the environmental campaign, public controls are gradually enhanced, so the Green Schooner campaign changes slowly, moving from one action to check up on the sea conditions (which also remains) to broader spectrum of initiatives: the promotion of activities to report illegal buildings, and illegal waste management on the beaches. Among these activities, the better known is the campaign to bring down two hotels that had been build illegally, the Fuenti Hotel in Vietri sul Mare and the 'Saracinesca' in Punta Perotti (Bari).[3]

Ecomafia

The word ecomafia appears for the first time in 1994 in the first report written by Legambiente with the help of Eurispes and Carabinieri. It was then a neologism. A few years later Zingarelli have certified the usefulness of this term.

The collaboration with the Carabinieri was not granted for an environmental organization in the mid 90s. The task was entrusted to Enrico Fontana, a journalist, a past in the newspaper Paese Sera and then at Espresso. With Stefano Ciafani, Nunzio Cirino and Lorenzo Miracle they started to collect and systematize information and data about environmental crimes. This led to the Report Ecomafia, a job in a few years has become a reference for those who work to suppress this phenomenon. The relationship grew to work with all law enforcement agencies and now Legambiente works with the National Anti-Mafia pool to fight ecomafie.

Mal'Aria

Mal'Aria (i.e. bad air a pun about the malaria disease) is one of the historic campaigns of the association. Every year, during the months of January and February are held initiatives to boost public transport at the expense of private transport, the main cause of poor air quality of the city, especially because of the notorious fine dust (PM 10). On the other hand, the occasional 'car free days' seem to do little to improve air quality. One of the most characteristic aspects of the initiative is the exposure of 'smog catching sheets' simple white sheets that are exposed in the open air (from windows, balconies etc.). Especially in "sensitive" areas, urban centers, industrial areas, schools. After a month, the blackening of the sheet is at the same time a very clear and low tech indicator to demonstrate the quality of the air we breath.

Most famous activists

See also

References

  1. ↑ Roberto Della Seta, La difesa dell'ambiente in Italia, FrancoAngeli 2000
  2. ↑ The referendum in Italy after Fukushima disaster
  3. ↑ Alberto Fiorillo, Marco Fratoddi, Sebastiano Venneri, Ricomincio da Trenta, sfide battaglie e buone idee per il futuro dell'Italia, La biblioteca del Cigno 2010
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