The area affected by the interventions of the “GAL (Local Action Group) L’Altra Romagna” consists of the foothill, hilly, and mountainous areas of the provinces of Ravenna, Forlì-Cesena
In economic terms, it can be said that this territory, being geographically decentralized compared to the Emilia road axis, along which the Romagna production system developed, has experienced a different pace of development that mainly affects the primary sector, namely agriculture and rural economy, but with small-sized businesses. The tertiary sector is growing, influenced by new lifestyle trends oriented towards health and wellness, which organize services that promote tourism.
The manufacturing sector continues to involve a significant portion of employment, retaining individuals who, for various reasons, do not wish to engage in agricultural enterprises. The territorial characteristic, both from a socio-economic and environmental perspective, is homogeneity: forests, parks and nature reserves, thermal springs, and “deposits” of high-quality agricultural productions are the leitmotif that repeats from the Faenza Apennine ridge to the Rimini Apennine ridge, passing through the Forlì Apennine. These natural resources are so deeply rooted in local histories that they have provided a valid stimulus for the development of services and tourism businesses. At the same time, a process has been initiated to systematize the new tourism offer, to organically connect it with the enhancement of the cultural, naturalistic, and traditional heritage of the various localities.
The municipalities included in the area known as “L’Altra Romagna” are 25, with a total population approaching one hundred thousand over an area of more than 2100 square kilometers. The province that has the most impact is the Province of Forlì-Cesena with 20 municipalities, followed by the Province of Ravenna with 5 municipalities.
The Mountain Unions in the territory of Gal L’Altra Romagna identified are 4: Union of Romagna Faentina, Mountain Union of the Forlì Apennines, Vallesavio Union, Rubicone and Mare Union.
The aerial view of the territory affected by the Local Action Group called “L’Altra Romagna” allows us to trace the sides of an imaginary quadrilateral, which we can identify with Romagna itself, closed by two unequivocal borders, to the East by the Adriatic Sea and to the West by the eastern slope of the Apennines, and marked to the Northwest and Southeast by two lines approximately perpendicular to both the Adriatic and the Apennine ridge. If we exclude the plains that occupy about two-sevenths of this territory, we have hills and mountains, which is what has been called “L’Altra Romagna”.
The morphology of the land has genetically imprinted the scars of a distant geological evolution, lasting millions of years, during which the sea and the land almost continuously contested supremacy, and when the latter, accumulating and stratifying, emerged from the former, it, aided by the force of extreme cataclysms, reconquered it by invading the newly emerged coasts.
Thus, the hilly reliefs were formed, today pleasant places where we love to spend leisure hours or where we live, such as in Val Lamone, in Brisighella, or in Val Senio, in Riolo Terme. Sometimes these land emergences, today gentle hills, were dragged where man began to inhabit them by disastrous cataclysms, and they settled in more or less inclined positions or even elevated vertically (just look from afar at Mount Titano, although politically outside our reference territory). But some reliefs originated from the evaporation of brackish and marshy waters where colonies of bacteria, reproducing, caused the formation of gypsum and sulfur, and we are at the heights of Brisighella and Riolo Terme, but also of the Predappio area. If we then stop to admire the clay hills carved by the characteristic “calanchi,” we must go back until we find under the marine expanse, then retreated, a very compact and predominantly clayey sedimentation (Brisighella, Riolo, Castrocaro), and when we reach, at the top, the Apennine ridge, today covered by the generous mantle of the Casentino Forests National Park, well, that was the first strip of land that emerged and saw the light of the sun, about fifty million years ago.
Over the millennia, man has intelligently used what he found under his feet; the first inhabitants perhaps passed through this territory during the Paleolithic period as nomads. The first settled tribes are more recent, between the first and second millennium BC, and were mainly engaged in pastoralism and modest forms of agricultural activity, but there was the exception, shortly after 1000 BC, of the Villanovan civilization (we are in the Rimini area) which left signs of an evolution from pastoralism to an agro-industrial activity, especially in Verucchio.
Subsequently, history was made with the succession of arrivals and departures, conquests and defeats, first of the Gauls over the “Apennine” populations, then of the Romans over the Gauls, and later there were the Exarchs and the Lombards and the beginning of the political jurisdiction of the Church. When entering the medieval era, almost everywhere, on the tops of medium-high hills, castles, fortresses, strongholds, and towers were built. but also churches and abbeys, and the walls were strengthened and expanded. These would be very useful for a long time, due to the repeated conflicts and factional struggles and the wars unleashed by the Lords of the different dynasties settled, some in Faenza (Manfredi), some in Forlì (Ordelaffi), and then the Da Polenta in Ravenna and the Guidi in much of the Apennines.
Living today: promoting and developing
The current populations of the reference territory have understood the importance of these historical signs and, having overcome the period during which the trends of national economies had induced many to abandon the places of their family history (urbanization), have reclaimed the agricultural resources and have planned and carried out the careful restoration of the buildings (fortresses, castles, palaces, churches, and abbeys), which fortunately had survived the centuries, overcoming the challenge of wars, earthquakes, the wear of time, and human neglect. In these buildings, children of history, today you can visit museums rich in archaeological and historical heritage, contemporary exhibitions are organized, musical events are held, and around these memories, the culture of the popular festival has developed, bringing people to the squares and streets and becoming a festival when it brings to the forefront the fruits of the earth, those products that in the past were the food for the survival of the native peoples, chestnuts, fruits, vegetables, grapes, cereals, and whatever else has fed man on these lands.
Today, everything is to be saved and enhanced, everything that was born and grew under the sky and everything that flows and lives underground, such as the ancient and precious thermal waters that in Bagno di Romagna, Brisighella, and Riolo Terme continue to provide wellness thanks to the knowledge that the populations have acquired. And still under the rock, thanks to the expert guidance of local people, you can discover the wonders of caves and underground waterways. All the greenery that surrounds us 360° is at our disposal, from the green hilly paths among olive groves and vineyards to the dense forests, climbing towards the Apennine peaks, through protected parks and chestnut and beech woods.
There is no corner where the visitor feels abandoned. The hospitality of the inhabitants, that attitude which is synonymous with Romagna everywhere, has become a service capability, that is, it has transformed into a tourism business: there are hotels in the thermal resource locations, there are farmhouses scattered in the hills, there are Bed & Breakfasts that increasingly open with families, and youth hostels and campsites. The culture of hospitality permeates the territory from the Apennine ridge, where Visitor Centers to the forests have been created (a gateway for a safe visit, but also a place for meetings and deepening the knowledge of nature) to the hilly localities where every inhabitant feels like a protagonist of the tourism offer and actively collaborates in the countless initiatives that are organized continuously within the Mountain Communities.
If, therefore, the aerial view of the territory could allow us to distinguish, almost simultaneously, the different bands of territory that slope from the Apennines towards the plain, only the patient and curious exploration on the ground, often leaving the main roads to take the municipal or hamlet roads, and not always paved, allows us to enter into the daily life of the Mountain Unions: you can enter the chestnut forest and, with the owners’ permission, collect its fruit; with the necessary authorization, mushrooms and truffles are sought in the undergrowth, berries are the precious component of rare jams and preserves that we can buy at the companies of the mountain localities, directly from the producer or at the sales stalls at the Festivals; sheep, goat, and cattle farms, often small but excellent farms, provide us, thanks to the work of the cheesemakers, with cheeses of great flavor and genuineness, characteristics that become unique when the forms are left to mature in caves, like those of Sogliano and Predappio; the cattle farms that most characterize our land are those of the Romagnola breed, which offer high-quality certified meat; and the pigs are no less when they belong to the ancient and rediscovered breed, called Mora Romagnola; the orchards extend up to 300 meters above sea level and are apricot, cherry, lower down kiwi and figs, and at different altitudes a variety of ancient fruits, called “forgotten,” but reintegrated into local kitchens; some vegetables have imposed themselves for their perseverance, so genetically motivated, like that of the shallot of Riolo Terme, having mobilized human resources for an annual festival dedicated to it; festivals also in honor of the prugnolo in Cusercoli di Civitella (FC) and the bartolaccio in Tredozio (FC). When you reach the panoramic altitudes of the first hills, you find yourself walking among olive groves that sprout everywhere, even in private gardens, and here and there the mills, private or social: from Brisighella (RA), where the fruit of the millenary olive trees of the area has obtained the DOP, the olive accompanies us almost uninterruptedly to the Valconca, which allows it to coexist even near the chestnut trees in Montefiore. But at these altitudes, the undisputed protagonist is the vineyard, which continues undisturbed to produce the fruit from which man has learned to extract the exquisite nectar: Sangiovese, Albana, Trebbiano, Cagnina, Pagadebit compete for the consumer’s favor on daily tables and of connoisseurs in banquets and quality dining venues, not only in Romagna but increasingly widely in different continents where they are exported.
The close encounter with the territory could be planned in search of the other great typical resource, which is craftsmanship: each of the Mountain Unions preserves not only the memory but the living art that for various reasons was born and developed in a village or district. This is made possible by the perseverance and sometimes the courage of men and women who have chosen to continue what their grandparents and fathers had started in their families. Here too, the beginnings often had their pretext in the nature of the territory or the needs of daily life: where there was a clay quarry, containers and objects were built, which were then fired in kilns, and even today the most varied objects are forged, fired, glazed, and decorated (Faenza, Rocca S. Casciano); clay was also the stimulus for the construction of the “testo” or pan that was once used to bake the Romagna piadina, and today two pan makers, husband and wife, in Montetiffi, continue this activity; to procure work tools, blacksmiths worked, and still do, iron by forging and beating it in the fire; to cover the animals on market days, fabrics were printed, coloring them with rust, today some artisans continue to print fabrics by hand according to the traditional technique and offer them as a decoration for homes or dining venues; a vein of stone, strong and durable, gray-blue in color, called “Pietra Serena” and exploited already in the Middle Ages, has been reactivated in the areas of Sarsina and Verghereto and has stimulated not only extraction but its processing on site to produce original elements, highly requested, for construction even abroad.
