Local Development Issues - Baton Rouge and L'Aquila

Today I was asked to make a presentation to a class in International Economics by Professor Lelio Iapadre. The seminar was attended by several professors, business leaders and students in International Economics, both graduate and undergraduate. I was able to meet Dr. Alessandro Tosoni, Analyst with the Banca D'Italia, at the seminar and will be visiting the leadership in the Banca D'Italia tomorrow for a meeting and lunch. I gave an overview of the Baton Rouge and Louisiana economy and the role of Louisiana State University in the economic development of the state and local community. I touched on the disasters, hurricanes and oil spill, and gave a detailed presentation on the Louisiana Business & Technology Center, the LSU South Research Park and other programs of the LBTC and LSU in disaster recovery. They were very interested in the university's role in both business incubation and economic development. The majority of incubators in Italy are not affiliated with universities and act very independent of academic institutions. A presentation followed mine, by the economic development officer from the Abruzzo Region who described three incubators operating in Abruzzo, 1. Mosciano, 2. Sulmona, 3. Avezzano but none in L'Aquila. The students asked if there was thoughts of opening one in L'Aquila, but the response was negative. It does appear that the university is very interested in establishing a "virtual incubator" in L'Aquila to stimulate entrepreneurship and to foster growth in the university spinoff companies. The addition of the 1,000,000 euro venture fund certainly will help develop the virtual incubator. I will be meeting with the administration over the next three weeks to provide information on how this can be done.

Guardia di Finanza - L'Aquila May 26, 2010

Today, Professor Mori set up a tour and meeting at the Guardia di Finanza, Comando Scuola Ispettori e Sovrintendenti. We were hosted by Ten. Col. Paolo Carretta, Capo Uffcio Addestramento e Studi. We were given a presentation and shown videos on the role of the Guardia di Finanza in the days of the earthquake on April 6, 2009. The Guardia is a department of the Italian Minister of Finance and serves multiple roles including military and police. They have a large training facility in L'Aquila and it served as a command post, rescue center, staging center, emergency housing center, hospital and more during the aftermath of the earthquake. It reminded me much of the LSU South Research Park which was the staging area for all of the emergency responders going into New Orleans during the aftermath of Katrina. The original Scuola for the Guardia was established in 1896. The work done by the Guardia immediately after the earthquake was heroic. They went in to rescue the injured, recover the dead, secure the area to prevent further injury or loss of life and provide any needed services to begin the recovery process. Their officers are present today when touring the devastated areas of the historic city. Another highlight of the tour was to see the work done by the partnership between the Guardia and the Vigili del Fucco (Fire Department). The video showed both groups going into the damaged churches and museums and saving priceless works of art, church artifacts and even the Tomb of Pope Celestine V. The churches were secured, valuable works taken to safety and then repairs were able to begin. During the tour of the Guardia di Finanza, we were shown the rooms where the G 8 summit was held in the months after the quake and the residence set up for President Obama. The Guardia was able to respond to the requests to host the G 8 in L'Aquila to bring attention to the disaster. They responded by providing logistics and security for the event that got international attention and even prompted President Obama to support the trip for the L'Aquila faculty to visit the USA, including Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. I will post pictures of the facility during a future blog.

sites in Rome prior to meeting with Fulbright and INEA

INEA Board Room in Rome May 24

26 May 2010

s Today's schedule calls for two presentations set up by the Department of Economics at L'Aquila and Professor Margherita Mori. First I will be part of a program on Business Incubators with Professor Lelio Iapadre, Associate Professor in International Economics entitled "Local Development Issues - Baton Rouge and L'Aquila. The purpose is detailing how the LBTC works and how the university and LBTC plays a major role in disaster business recovery. A presentation will also be made by economic developers from the Abruzzo Region on Italian business incubators although their is currently none in L'Aquila and most Italian incubators are not University affiliated. This afternoon, I will be meeting with the Guardia di Finanza, a policia arm of the Italian Ministry of Finance. I will get a tour and give a brief presentation on the LBTC and our success stories.

Fulbright and INEA Meetings in Rome

On May 24, I had a meeting in Rome with Professors Anna Tozzi, Margherita Mori from L'Aquila and Maria Grazia Quieti, PhD and executive director of the Fulbright US - Italy Fulbright Commission and Sandro Zinani, Educational Advisor. We had an excellent meeting and they explained the mission and goals of the Fulbright US -Italy Commission and the desire to support the efforts of LSU and Universita L'Aquila in developing a lasting relationship that could result in both faculty and student exchanges as well as joint research and study projects. I indicated to Dr. Grazia Quieti that we are already discussing these items and that Professor Mori and I are discussing the publishing of case studies the show the lessons learned in handling both disasters, the hurricanes and the earthquake. We concluded the meeting with a video interview that can be posted on the Fulbright website and I have been asked to write an article for their newsletter. The website is www.fulbright.it We left from the Fulbright office to go to the offices of the National Institute of Agriculture Economy (INEA) which is a research arm of the Italian Ministry of Agriculture. The INEA had a number of staff members present for my presentation and they were very interested in the LSU/ LBTC's mobile classroom or incubator on wheels and our rural entrpreneurship program. It appears that much of Italy is rural and this ministry is looking for effective ways to assist rural farmers in developing value added products and stimulating the economy in these rural areas. They also showed great interest in the economic impact of the LBTC and the food incubator program which was developed after Katrina in Norco Louisiana. Martina Bolli, one of the INEA researchers, requested materials that I will be sending her on several aspects of my presentation. We concluded the presentation with a brief Q&A then we departed for L'Aquila.