ITALIAN STUDENTS IN JASLO

Hi !
the moment to visit Jaslo has come at last !
The delegation of Italian students - Elisa, Valentina, Elena, Simone and Nicolò - left with their two teachers Mrs Morlacchi and Mrs Rossetti for Poland on Sunday 20th April. After a rather long but exciting air + bus trip we reached our friends in Jaslo who
welcomed us with their host families. Our adventure in Poland could start !

Here you can see Elisa in the role of the crazy chemist ! On our first day at school we made tests on the quality of river and tap water we had taken from Italy. It was quite a nice experiment of multilingual scientific session !




We had a lot of fun and could put in practice what we learn at school in our Chemistry class.

After all the efforts at school, here we are on a mountain track on the top of Liwotz mountain.

We really enjoyed the fresh air and the beautiful nature in the woods ! How different from our towns at home !!

On Tuesday our day started with an official visit to the Province Administration.
After exchanging some information about our project and our school , we were given some presents and shown the main parts of the building hosting the offices of the Province Administration.
We also talked about the possibility to cooperate in the near future with new projects involving tourism, languages , culture and sports.

EU ENVIRONMENT COMMISSION COMING TO NEAPLES

The EU Environment Commission will be in Neaples on 15 February.

Independently from the results of the emergency plan started by the Italian local government, Brussels wants to carry on the infraction procedure against Italy for disrespecting the directives on rubbish disposal.

The procedure will follow three steps and after the first warnings the EU will send the Italian government an official evaluation of the status of the crisis.

From then on Italy will have two months to comply with EU directives.

If the results still are not satisfactory, Italy will be condamned to paying a fine ranging from 9920€ to 714000€ for each day of infraction.

The worst is that the procedure is expected to finish not sooner than 2010.

FIRST REACTIONS - LOOKING FOR A SOLUTION TO THE CRISIS

In Neaples even priests are asking people to start the rubbish segregation as the only way to overcome the crisis.

In Quarto ( Neaples ) there are about 2900 tons of rubbish scattered along the roads, close to the houses despite the intervention of the army forces.





In San Giorgio ( Neaples ) soldiers have created two special areas for paper and plastics.


The town administration is working on a 5 - point program:


1) opening a site in town for segregated way


2) starting a door-to-door collection system for segregated waste


3) carrying out an information campaign


4) organizing police controls


5) planning regular assessments





In Ariano ( Neaples ) on Friday a protest against the opening of the landfill of " Difesa Grande " was organised. The landfill is supposed to receive 42000 tons of waste.





But the problem is not common to all towns in Campania. The mayors of 150 towns wrote a letter to the President of the Italian Republic, Giorgio Napolitano, to inform him that their administrations started rubbish segregation succesfully years ago. The declared their intention to support other towns in their first steps along this way.

STUDENTS IN NEAPLES EXPRESS THEIR OPINIONS

From the compositions made by the students of the 9th grade of Liceo Virgilio in Pozzuoli, Neaples, we can have an insight into the way young people see and live the dramatic waste crisis in Neaples.

Their thoughts and ideas are very clear and linear.

They suggest being more respectful to the environment and starting recycling; they criticize the local and regional governments and the organized criminality, the Camorra.

They propose to recude the use of plastics and prefer paper and glass instead and to choose not to use plastic shopping bags and extra-packing.

Everybody thinks that 15-year-olders don't care about these problems, but this is completely wrong: young teenagers speak about it and they are perfectly aware that their future is in danger.

LIVING WITH A LANDFILL

A lot of people in Campania have to live in close contact with landfills to set Neaples free from rubbish.

Opening the existing ( and already closed ) landfills is simply inevitable, said the extraordinary commissioner for the rubbish emergency in Campania in an interview.

He assured he is trying to do his best to create a basis of awareness and common sense which are the only way to overcome the problem.

He called everybody to help reducing the huge amounts of rubbish, starting from the world of industry and trade.

The commissioner declared that by the 28th January 90 tons of rubbish were removed from the streets.

The people of the towns which are most affected by the situation keep protesting in front of their town halls and in the streets.

RUBBISH EMERGENCY IN ITALY

Since Christmas some parts of the region of Campania in Southern Italy have been living a real emergency.

Tons of rubbish have remained uncollected for weeks and now the situation is collapsing.

The responsibility is in the hands of local politicians who have joined forces with the local criminal system.

All around the world the image and reputation of Italy is seriously endangered.

The consequences for Italian economy and tourism are already visible and will have a serious impact in the upcoming months.

We have collected some newspaper articles and realised a short press report about some of the most important aspects of this sad moment of our history.

Stay tuned and send in your comments !