The area covered by the interventions of the “LAG (Local Action Group) L’Altra Romagna” consists of the foot of hills areas, hilly and mountainous provinces of Ravenna, Forlì-Cesena.
In economic terms we can say that this area, being geographically decentralized to the axis of the Via Emilia, along which it has developed the production system Romagna, had a different pace of development that are interested, however, especially the primary sector, namely agriculture and rural economy, but with small size companies. Growth in the tertiary sector, which reflects the new trends of life-oriented health consciousness and well-being by virtue of which they organize services that encourage tourism.
The manufacturing sector continues to affect a significant share of employment in place that keeps people who for various reasons do not want to devote themselves for the farm. The spatial feature, both in terms of socio-economic and from the environment is uniformity: forests, nature reserves and parks, hot springs, “fields” of agricultural production of high quality are the leitmotiv that recurs from the Apennine ridge Rimini to Faenza Apennine ridge, passing through that of ‘Appennino Forli. Natural resources are well rooted in local histories that have given valuable stimulus to the development of services and tourism businesses. At the same time has started a process to make the new tourist system for organic connections with the development of cultural, natural and traditional of the various locations.
The municipalities included in the area called “L’Altra Romagna” are 25 for a total population is over one hundred thousand units over a range of over 2200 sq km The highest percentage of inhabitants, or 86%, is established High Mountain territories. The province that will most affect is the Province of Forlì-Cesena with 20 municipalities contribute 75% of surface area. Followed by the Province of Ravenna with 5 municipalities.
Origins of the area and geological evolution
This aerial view of the area covered by the Local Action Group called “L’Altra Romagna” allows you to paint the sides of an imaginary square which can be identified with the same Romagna, enclosed by two unambiguous boundaries, from the Adriatic Sea to the east and west from the eastern side of the Apennines, and marked in the North West and South East by two lines roughly perpendicular to both the Adriatic, and the Apennine ridge .. If we exclude this area from the plains which occupy about two-seventh, we have hills and mountains, or what was called “L’Altra Romagna.
The morphology of the ground genetically imprinted on the wounds of a distant geological evolution, millions of years, during which the land and sea fought for supremacy, almost continuously, and when the second, accumulating and stratifying, it emerged from the first, relying on the power of extreme disasters, the regained again invading the coasts first emerged.
Thus was formed the hills, now pleasant places where we love to spend hours of leisure or where we live, so in Val Marecchia to Verucchio Torriana and, as in Val Lamone, in Bristol, or Val Senio, Riolo Terme. Sometimes these emergencies of the land, rolling hills today, were dragged to where the man began to live with disasters are ruinous, and they settle into positions more or less vertically inclined, or even higher (just watch from afar off, even if Mount Titano, politically from the territory of our reference). But some surveys have originated from the evaporation of brackish waters and marshes where colonies of bacteria reproducing resulted in the formation of gypsum and sulfur, and we are at the heights of Bristol and Riolo Terme, but also predappiese . But if we stop to admire the hills of clay dug from the characteristic “badlands” we must go back up to find under the sea lying, then retired, settling a very compact and predominantly clay (Bristol, Riolo, Castrocaro). And when we reach at the top, the ridge of the now covered by the generous coat of Casentino, well that was the first piece of land that came out and saw the light of the sun, about fifty million years ago.
Human settlements
The man has used over the millennia with intelligence what he found under his feet, the first inhabitants probably passed over this territory, during the period of the Paleolithic, as nomads. The first sedentary tribes are more recent, between the first and second millennium BC, and is especially devoted to sheep farming and small forms of agricultural activity, but there was the exception, not long after the year one thousand BC, Villanova civilization (we are in Rimini ) that left the signs of an evolution from a sheep farm activities – especially in industrial Verucchio.
Following the story is done with the sequence of arrivals and departures, conquests and defeats, first on the people of the Gauls “Apennine”, then the Romans over the Gauls and then there were the Exarchs and the Lombards and the beginning of the political jurisdiction of Church. When you enter the medieval almost everywhere, on top of the mid and high hills, they build castles, forts, towers. as well as churches and abbeys and reinforce and broaden the walls. That will be very useful for a long time, because of repeated conflicts and struggles of faction and the war waged by the Lords of the different dynasties that settled, some in Faenza (Manfredi), who in Rimini (Malatesta), who in Forlì (Ordelaffi) and then the Da Polenta in Ravenna and driven in large part of the Apennines.
Living today: to promote and develop
The current population of the area in question have understood the importance of these signs of history and, over the period during which the performance of national economies had led many to leave their homes of their family history, (urbanization) have taken possession of agricultural resources and have designed and built the careful restoration of the building works (fortresses, castles, palaces, churches and abbeys and churches), which fortunately had won the challenge through the centuries of wars, earthquakes and the wear of time and neglect of ‘man. In these buildings, children of history, today you can visit the museums full of archaeological and historical endowment, are organized contemporary exhibitions, musical events, around these memories has developed the culture of the festival, which brings in the people in the streets and squares and become festival brings to the fore when the fruit of the earth, those products that were in the past the food for the survival of indigenous peoples, chestnuts, fruit, vegetables, grapes, cereals and whatever else the man has fed on these lands.
Today everything you want to save and enhance everything that was born and raised in the sky and the flowing and lives under the ground, as the ancient and precious thermal waters in Bagno di Romagna, in Brisbane, to continue to give welfare Riolo Terme thanks to the knowledge that people have acquired. And yet beneath the rock, thanks to the expert guidance of local people, you can learn about the wonders of the caves and underground waterways. All the green, then to 360 ° around us is at our disposal, from the green hilly roads through olive groves and vineyards to the dense forests, climbing towards the Apennine peaks, through the parks and protected forests of chestnut and beech trees.
Hospitality
No corner where the visitor feels abandoned. The hospitality of the people, that attitude means that wherever Romagna, has become a service capacity, or turned into tourist business: hotels are in the localities of thermal resource, are scattered around the farm in the hills, are B & B that more and more frequently at the start families, and youth hostels and campsites. The culture of hospitality permeates the land from the Apennine ridge, where they were to visit the Centers for forest (a gateway to secure a visit, but also a place of meetings and in-depth knowledge of nature) to the hill towns where every citizen feels the protagonist of tourism and works closely with the many initiatives within the mountain communities are organized in loops.
Typical food products
Therefore, if the aerial view of the area could allow us to distinguish, almost simultaneously, the different bands of territory that extends from the Apennines to the plain, only the patient and inquisitive exploration on land, often leaving the streets of the great distance to take those municipal or village, and not always paved, it allows us to get into the daily lives of mountain communities: you can enter the forest of chestnut and with the permission of the owners reap the fruit with the ‘relevant permits in the undergrowth We are looking for mushrooms and truffles, berries are the component of precious rare jams and compotes that we can buy from companies in the mountain resorts, from the factory or on the shelves at festivals, and the herds of sheep, goats and cattle , often small, but give us good farms, thanks to the work of cheesemakers, cheese with big flavor and quality, characteristics that become unique when the forms are left to mature in caves, like those of the threshold and Predappio, or under the ash as Montefiore Conca, bovine herds that characterize most of our land are those of the Romagna breed offering high quality meat certified, and pigs are no different when they belong to the ancient race and found, that Mora Romagna, go to the orchards to 300 meters above sea level and are apricots, cherries, kiwi and figs and further down to the different altitudes a variety of antique fruit, called “forgotten”, but reinstated in the local cuisine and some vegetables have been imposed for their perseverance, so genetically motivated as that of shallot Riolo Terme, have mobilized resources for a dedicated annual festival, festivals in honor of ‘Torriana and asparagus in Montebello, the potato Montescudo of blackthorn in Cusercoli and Bartolaccio in Tredington. And when it comes to the scenic heights of the first hills you are walking among the olive trees that sprout everywhere, even in private gardens, and mills here and there, individuals and society: from Bristol, where the fruit trees of the age distribution area obtained the DOP, the olive tree takes us almost interrupted until Valconca that allows him to live even in the vicinity of the chestnut trees at Montefiore. But at this altitude the undisputed star is the vineyard that continues unabated to produce the fruit from which man has learned to take the delicious nectar: Sangiovese, Albana, Trebbiano, Cagnina, Pagadebit vie for the consumer on the table every day and connoisseurs at banquets and catering premises in quality, not just in Romagna but more and more widely in the different continents where they are exported.
Typical handmade products
L ‘close encounter with the territory could be programmed to search the great resource it is typical that the craft: each of the mountain communities not only preserves the memories, but the art alive who for various reasons, was born and developed in a country or district. This is made possible by the perseverance and sometimes by the courage of men and women who have chosen to continue that in his own family and grandparents and fathers had begun. Here too, the beginnings were often their excuse in the nature of the territory or in the necessities of everyday life where there was the quarry were built of clay vessels and objects that were then baked in ovens, and even today many different objects mold, bake it, decorate it and disposing of (Faenza, Montefiore, Rocca S. Casciano), the clay was also the stimulus for the construction of the “text” or pan that once was used to cook the flat bread of Romagna and today two tegliai, husband and wife, Montetiffi, continue this activity, working tools to get the smiths worked, and still do, forged and wrought iron fire, to cover the cattle market were printed in the days of the rust-colored canvas Today few artisans continue to print the canvas by hand using traditional techniques and offer as a reason for beautification of the house or premises catering, a line of stone, strong and durable, gray in color – blue, known as “Pietra Serena” and exploited in the Middle Ages, has been reactivated in the areas Sarsina and Verghereto and gave stimulus to the activity not only extraction, but his on-site processing to derive the original features, high demand for construction abroad.